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HJ 6645 
. E37 
1946 
Copy 1 


“THEY HAVE TO GO OUT” 





An historical sketch 
of the Uc £ c Coast Guard 

By F* R*; FEDRIDGE 
Formerly Lt* Ccmdr• USCGE(T) 


prepared in the 
Historical Section 
Public Information Division 
U. S* Coast Guard Headquarters 
1300 E Street, N» W. 
Washington, D* C« 







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SOURCES 




HAMILTON, Alexander - Letters (1769-1791) 

SHOEMAKER, C.F. Captain U.S.R.C.S., Chief, Revenue Cutter Service 

Revenue Cutter Service U. S . (190lt) 

EVANS (Lt. S.H* USCCi) and LAWRENCE (Prof. AA USCG) 

The History and Organization of the U. S. Coast 

Guard (193«) 


U. S. COAST GUARD 

U. S. COAST GUARD 

U. S. COAST GUARD 

U. S. COAST GUARD 

U. S. COAST GUARD 


HISTORICAL SECTION, PUBLIC INFORMATION DIVISION 
Coast Guard’s Ope rations Under the Treasury 

1'93%-Ul end 19 U 6 " (manuscript only) 

AUXILIARY TRAINING UNIT 

The U, S. Coast Guard - Its History, Vessels 

and Doctrine (19^2) * - 

RESEARCH AND STATISTICAL SECTION, OPERATIONS DIVISION 
Coast Guard Assistance (19^2) 

STATISTICAL DIVISION 
Captains of the Port (19d3) 

The Coast Guard a~ar - Dec. 7, I?Ul - Apr» 12, ±9hk 

Introduction I (19UU) 

HISTORICAL SECTION, PUBLIC .INFORMATION DIVISION 
The Coast Guard at War - Greenland Patrol II (1?U5) 
The Coast Guard at War - Alaska III (19^6) 


SECRETARY OF TIE TREASURY - Annual Reports - 1915-19U6 















































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'‘THEY HAVE TO GO OUT" 

CREATION OF The Coast Guard, through its predecessors, the 

THE REVENUE * Revenue Cutter Service and the- earlier Revenue" 

MARINE - 1790 ' Marine, has been in existence since August U, 

1790,, On that date Congress authorized the 
construction of the "ten boats" whose con¬ 
struction Alexander Hamilton, first Secretary of the Treasury ? had recom¬ 
mended in April'of that same year. 

"Information from several quarters," Hamilton-reported to Congress,' 
"proves the necessity of having them; nor can they, in the opinion of 
the Secretary, fail to contribute, in a material degree, to the security 
of the revenue, much more than will compensate for the expense'of the 
establishment." 

The year before in 1789, Congress had passed the first tariff act 
and in a letter dated October 8th of that year, Hamilton had written 
to :• Mr. Jedediah Huntington, Collector of Customs at New York, inquiring 
about "contraband." Apparently merchants were complaining hbotit.the 
arrival of goods from Europe on which’, presumably because of the low 
prices at which*they were being offered for sale, duty had obviously r\pt 
been paid, Mr, Hamilton asked Mr. Huntington to let him know about such 
complaints. 

The first system of national tariffs on imports must have been 
inaugurated by the first Congress with some little' trepidation• ' It 
had not been so long before, that the British enforcement of the stamp, 
act and-other laws designed to Increase the revenues of the Crown, had 
led to the Boston Tea'Party. Hamilton was now, Of : necessity," stepping 
lightly in enforcement procedure'. What he wanted : were facts about' 
"contraband." He mentions in his letter to the Collector the expediency 
of employing boats for the security of thfe' revenue, - "if any appear 
to you necessary," He’also Wants to know if any boats had: been employed- 
by the States and to what extent import duti . n had been- evaded in the 
past. The Colonies, it must be'remembered, nad rather gloried in their 
evasion of - the British levies on their imports and such -habits were 
hard to break. Now, however, Hamilton was confronted with a different 
situation. The new government needed revenue/badly and' indirect 
taxation, through" customs duties> was not only supposed to 'be painless - 
but could be made easily effective, it was' thought. It* took boats, 
however, Hamilton believed, to catch the'evil doers'before they, re’achud 
the ports "with their "contraband." Hamilton wanted*, control of these 
boats. 

Hamilton, it must be remembered, was a Federalists He- was not con¬ 
cerned about the loss of revenues by the States, for under the newly 





adopted constitution the States could no longer levy import duties. 

There was as yet no Federal Navy. Hamilton suggested to the Collector 
in this letter, speaking of the States, "it is equally their duty and 
their interest to help enforce the national tariff act." The upshot 
of the matter was that Hamilton had the duty and need to enforce the 
first Federal tariff act but he had no Federal enforcement machinery. 
This enforcement machinery was still controlled by the States and 
the States were not only touchy about losing their revenues but were 
skeptical about the need for any import duties if they were not 
allowed to levy them. It was a delicate situation, but a Revenue 
Marine seemed the only answer. At least Congress thought so. 

At its very inception, therefore, the Coast Guard was confronted 
with a difficult task which required great tact and the exhibition of 
good judgment in dealing with the public. This has in general- been ' 
the Coast Guard*s role ever since. Hamilton*s instructions on June'It, 
1791, were that officers of the new Revenue Marine display activity, 
vigilance, and firmness, marked with moderation and good temper. "Upon 
these last qualities not less than the former," he warned, "must depend 
the success xxxxx of the establishment," officers must "always keep in 
mind that their countrymen are freemen, and, as such, are impatient of 
everything that bears the least mark of a domineering spirit." They 
must "refrain with the most guarded circumspection, from whatever has 
the semblance of haughtiness, rudeness or insult." They must over¬ 
come difficulties by cool and temperate perseverance in their duty, 
by address and moderation, rather than by vehemence or violence. 

This is sound, and timeless counsel for all law enforcement officers. 

"An objection has been made to the measure," Hamilton reported to 
Congress in recommending the "ten boats", "as betraying an improper dis¬ 
trust of the merchants; but that objection can have no weight when it is 
considered that it would be equally applicable to all the precautions 
comprehended in the existing system; all of which proceed on the 
supposition, too well founded to be doubted, that there are persons 
concerned in trade in every country who will, if they can, evade the 
public dues for their private benefits, Justice to the body of mer¬ 
chants of the United States demands an acknowledgement that they have, 
very generally, manifested a disposition to conform to the national 
laws, which does them honor, and authorizes confidence in their probity. 
But every considerate member of that body knows that this confidence 
admits of exceptions, and it is essentially to the interest of the 
greater number that every possible guard should be set on the fraudu¬ 
lent few, which does not, in fact, tend to the embarrassment of trade." 

"The utility of an establishment of this nature," he added, "must 
depend on the exertion, vigilance and fidelity of those to whom the 
charge of the boats shall be confided. If these are not respectable 
characters, they will rather serve to screen than detect frauds. To 
procure such, a liberal compensation must be given, and, in addition 


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to this, it. will, in the opinion of the Secretary be advisable that 
they be commissioned as officers of the Navy (this referred to the 
Navy created by an appropriation of the Continental* Congress on 
November 2, 1775, and dissolved at the conclusion of .the Revolutionary 
War, and not to the U* S. Navy which was hot founded until March 27, 
179U)• This will not only induce fit men, the.mere readily to engage, 
but will attach them to their duty by a nicer sense of honor*" 

The "liberal compensation” which Congress provided in the Act 
authorizing the construction of the ten cutters and which must have 
been considered ample enough in that day not to tempt them co n screen" 
rather than detect fraud" was $30 per month for each master, $20\- $ 16 , 
and .$lh v respectively for each of three mates,. $0 per men Mi for feur 
mariners and $h per month for two boys - those rates of pay being 
augmented by subsistence of "three rations per day 0 " 

While "log rolling" at this early stage in our history nay not 
have .grown to the proportions it attained later in maneuvering appro¬ 
priations through Congress, the fact that Hamilton rocmv/.unet d mil 
Congress approved "ten boats, two for the coasts, bay and harbors of 
Massachusetts and New Hampshire; one for the Sound between Long Island 
and Connecticut; one for the Bay of New York; , one for ihe - Pay of Dela¬ 
ware; two for the Bay of Chesapeake (these, of course, to-p-Iy-along 
the. neighboring coasts);.,one for the coasts, bays and Harbors of North 
Carolina; one for the coasts, bays, and harbors of South.Carolina; and■ 
one for.the coasts, bays and harbors of Georgia" indicates that even 
in the first Congress and by such a pronounced Federalist as Hamilton, 
consideration of the "folks back home" must have been paramount* 

Hamilton specified that he wanted "boats of from. to h.0 feet 
keel'xxxxx each having, one captain, one lieutenant, and six mariners, 
and armed with swivel^" - which were cannon that could be turned in 
any direction* "The iuirst cost of one of those boats" he concluded, 
"completely equipped may be computed at one thousand dollars* n 

The original cutters built were:, the MASSACHUSETTS, SCAMMEL. (cx- 
FERRET), ARGUS, 'VIGILANT, GENERAL GREENE, ACTIVE, VIRGINIA, .DILIGENCE, 
SOUTH CAROLINA, and PICKERING* They proved too small for the duties 
assigned them, however, and within a decade other vessels of greater 
size, accommodations and armament, .were provided p Between 1796-1799 
thirteen of these nefrer vessels were acquired* The first cutters had 
a complement of 80 men 'prescribed by -law, but when the quasi-war 
with' France began in 1798, complements were enlarged and both pay 
and subsistence, already increased twice within a few years, were 
again raised in 1799* 

FIRST COOPERATION When it was determined in 1798 to extend hostile 
WITH NAVY 1798-1799 operations against France 'to the waters of the 

West Indies, four fleets, under Commanders Barry 




Truxton, Tingey and Decatur, USN, comprising in all some 20 national 
vessels, were formed to prey upon French commerce and destroy that 
nation 1 s privateers. It was then that eight vessels of the Revenue 
Marine were .first placed in cooperation with this newly organized Navy 
and sailed with these fleets, doing fine service in the summer and 
fall of 1799. Twenty vessels under the French flag, privateers and 
others, were captured by those fleets and of these 16 were made 
prizes by vessels of the Revenue Marine, unaided, while they assisted 
in the capture of two others 0 

FIRST COMISSION Of interest to New Englanders is the fact that 

TO SEAGOING OFFICER the first commission issued to a seagoing officer 

of the United States was awarded to Hopiey Yeaton 
of New Hampshire on 21 March, 1791* Later, in 
October, 1791, Yeaton became master of the SCAMMEL (ex-FERRET)* Yeaton 
was a veteran of the Revolution having served as Barry’s third lieuten¬ 
ant on the continental frigate RALEIGH* Yeaton took the oath to uphold 
the constitution and a second oath to detect and prevent frauds against 
the revenue, a double oath which is taken by all commissioned officers 
of the Coast Guard even at the present time* 

EARLY ADMINISTRATION - The administration of the Revenue Marine was for 
RFAENUE MARINE many years very much decentralized, being for 

the most part, placed in the collectors of cus¬ 
toms of the various ports, who had the widest 
discretion in designating cruising grounds, repairs, discipline., and 
the shipping of crews, while masters furnished the rations. Officers 
were not transferred, and were usually appointed by the masters. For 
years promotions were without system and masters could be suspended by 
the collectors* Later, with the establishment of a Revenue Marine 
Bureau in the Treasury, under a captain, general administration was 
tightened; expenditures brought under closer control; officers periodi¬ 
cally transferred from station to station; and «Logs submitted monthly* 
Officers of the early Revenue Marine were authorized to board all 
vessels arriving within the United States or within four leagues of 
the coast if bound for an American port, to search thorn, to demand 
and certify their manifests, and to seal their hatches, remaining on 
board until arrival in the harbor. This boarding procedure has 
changed little during the years, and is today reflected in the pre¬ 
scribed duties of the Coast Guard* 

ENSIGN The Act of March 2, 1799* not only increased 

.'.HD TENNANT the authorized number of cutters and enlarged 

the scope of their functions but it confirmed 
the powers of the officers and provided for the 
design and display by its vessels of a distinctive ensign and "pendant*" 
These were described as an’bnsign and pendant consisting of sixteen 
perpendicular stripes, alternate red and white, the Union of the 
Ensign to be the Arms of the United States, in dark blue on a white 
Field." This design, based on the number of States of the original 








I 


Union, has undergone very slight change. By order of President Taft in 
1910* the distinctive emblem of the Revenue Cutter Service, as the Revenue 
Marine was first officially designated by the Secretary of the Treasury 
in 1832 and by Act of Congress in 1863, was to have been added to the 
ensign, but as no exact description of such an emblem existed at that time, 
it was not until' 1927 that the present' emblem was approved and made part 
of the Coast Guard ensign. The Act of 1799 conferred, by way of immunities, 
the right to fire on any craft which, after the hoisting of the ensign and 
pennant and the firing of a warning shot, persisted in a refusal to heave to. 


GROWTH OF 
MISCELLANEOUS 
DUTIES 1790 - 1946 

SUPPRESSION 
OF SLAVE TRADE 

1807 - 1861 


Not long after its organization the Revenue 
Marine found itself directly or indirectly 
invested with duties in addition to those of 
enforcing the revenue laws. One of such initial 
tasks was the enforcement of the state quarantine 
statutes. Coupled with its military duties was 
the suppression of piracy and of the slave trade. 
Under the provisions of a law passed in 1807 for¬ 


bidding the entry of slaves into the U 0 S., (ownership by American 
citizens of interests in slaves having been prohibited even earlier) the 
Revenue Marine, together with the Navy, took an active part in its en¬ 
forcement. In the course of this duty, many slavers were captured by 
the Revenue Marine cutters and 487 negroes in all were liberated. The 
Revenue Marine was assigned the enforcement of the neutrality, laws and 
later awarded the protection of the national live-oak timber preserves. 
To the Revenue Marine and its successor the Revenue Cuttr Service went 
the enforcement of the immigration laws; general police work in Alaska 
after we had acquired "Seward’s Folly" from Russia in 1867; the protec¬ 
tion of seals, game, fish, and sponges; furnishing assistance to fisher¬ 
men; enforcement of the navigation laws and anchorage regulations, in¬ 
cluding the oatrol of regattas; the suppression of mutinies on merchant 
vessels and the inspection of motorboats. The International Ice Patrol 
was’added in 1912, The duties of the service when* in 1915, the Revenue 
Cutter Service was merged with the Life Saving Service to become the 
Coast Guard, took on newer aspects as circumstances dictated, as in the 
case of enforcement of the Prohibition Laws after the adoption of the 
18th Amendment in 1917. Certification of lifeboat men in the crews of 
passenger carrying vessels, which the steamboat inspection service was 
not equipped to handle under the "Seaman’s Act," followed. The enforce¬ 
ment of the Oil Pollution Act of 1924) for the War Department, preceded 
the protection of halibut in the northern Pacific for the Bureau of 
Fisheries in 1926. In 1935 a Coast Guard officer was assigned to each 
of the large whaling vessels sailing under the American flag, in .order., 
to-orevent violations of the International Whaling Treaty, So ,the Co.ast 
Guard has become a seagoing handy man for almost every department of the 
government. 


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ASSISTANCE One of the most important activities of the 

CRUISING Service has been the assistance rendered vessels 

1831 - 1946 in distress and the saving of life and property 

at sea. Andrew Jackson’s Secretary of the 
Treasury, John McLane, in 1831, designated the 
Revenue Marine for this duty when he detailed seven cutters to patrol 
areas near their stations during the winter for this purpose. 'These 
patrol vessels were to remain at sea until obliged to return either 
by lack of supplies or stress of weather*, Later, in 1837, statutory 
authority for this winter cruising was forthcoming when the President 
was authorized to employ "public vessels" for the purpose of cruising 
on the coast in severe weather and of affording aid to "distressed 
navigators." Special authority to remove vessels, and floating dan¬ 
gers to navigation in the form of derelicts, was given the Revenue 
Cutter Service in 1906. With the merging of the duties of the Revenue 
Cutter Service with the Life Saving Service in 1915, therefore, the 
primary function of law enforcement had already been supplemented by 
an equally important function of providing maritime safety. These 
together with the third general function of military readiness con¬ 
stitute the three principal roles of the Coast Guard today. 

COOPERATION By the Act of February 25, 1799, the President 

WITH NAVY IN WAR was authorized to place in the naval establish- 

1799 - 1946 ment and employ accordingly, any and all vessels, 

which, as revenue cutters, had been increased 
in force and employed in defense of the Coast, 
whereupon their personnel might be allowed the pay and subsistence 
appropriate to the rates of the ships, being at the same time governed 
by the rules and discipline, established for the Navy. The Act of 
March 2, 1799, provided that the cutters "shall, whenever the President 
of the U, S, shall so direct, cooperate with the Navy of the U. S.," 
being at such times under the direction of the Secretary of the Navy. 

It was under this law that the Coast Guard has fought together with 
the Navy in every one of the. country’s wars at sea, although it was 
not until the Act of January 4, 1915, that the Coast Guard was expressly 
made part of the military forces of the U. S. operating "under the 
Treasury Department in time of peace and xxxx as a part of the Navy, 
subject to the orders of the Secretary of the Navy, in time of war or 
when the President shall so direct." 

QUASI WAR When the President, anticipating the action of 

WITH FRANCE Congress, placed the vessels-of the Revenue 

1798 - 1799 Marine under the orders of Benjamin Stoddert, 

the first Secretary of the Navy in 1798, they 
relinquished their normal status as revenue 
cutters, departed from defense only of the seacoast, and became part 
of the effort to create a naval force, at first patrolling between 
Nantucket and Cape Henry, and later convoying vessels and preying on 
French commerce in the West Indies in what was essentially a cruising 
war. 


On October 18, 1799, the PICKERING, with her 14 four pounders 
and 70 men fought the French privateer L’Egypte Conquise with eighteen 
guns, and a crew of 250. After a nine hour engagement the Frenchmen 


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struck her colors and was taken to 51 a Kitts, The PICKERING was lost 
in a storm* with all hands . in 1800 while enroute from New Castle, 

Delaware, to her station at Guadaloupe, In another engagement the 
EAGLE captured the French privateer HERITABLE and her prize ohe NANCY, 
Peace with; 1 the French ratified on February 3> 1601, found uhe Revenue 
Marine with ,17 vessels, many experienced officers, well-trained crews, 
and-an enviable record in peace and war. 

There followed, a period of retrenchment and economy under 
Albert Gallatin, Secretary of the Treasury under JeCferson.. The 
• Revenue Marine was reduced to its original size* Some of the older 
ships, like the MASSACHUSETTS, were sold at public auction, and the 
whole crew discharged except for the captain and the oldest com¬ 
missioned first lieutenant. The Collector at Boston was authorized 
to employ a barge until a new cutter of not more than 45 tons and 
crew of only six, was built. However, the Jeffersonian Democrats, 
despite their protestation of economy, soon had to expand the esta¬ 
blishment, • They handled the current war scare by instituting an 
embargo. To enforce the embargo the Revenue Marine needed more men 
and ships. Accordingly on July 6, 180?, twelve new vessels 
were authorized. The upper limit cf the r.ew ships was fixed at 
130 tons. After helping enforce the embargo, these cutters helped 
carry the naval burden in the War of 1812. 

’JAR OF 1612 In the War of 1812, the Revenue Marine, com¬ 

prising sixteen vessels, operated with numerous 
small gunboats, in protecting the coasting 
trade by convoy between ports, attacked or warded off attacks of pri¬ 
vateers and armed flotillas, sent out by British Squadrons which ranged 
freely along our coasts, and captured hostile armed merchantmen. Nine 
cutters, averaging 12 £ tons, armed with six to ten light guns, and with 
crews of 15 to 30, took 14 prizes. Within a week the JEFFERSON seized 
the PATRIOT, the first nrize cf the war and soon after the MADISON 
brought the brig SHAMROCK, 30C tons, into Savannah, following this with 
the capture of the WADE, laden with $20,000 in specie. The-VIGILANT 
took the British ship DART, sailing under letters of marque after a 
battle between Newport and Block Island, 

One of the most famous incidents of the War of 1812 is vividly 
recounted in the following :, extract from letters to a gentlc»man in 
New York” which appeared in the Hew York Evening Pest of October 14, 

1814, and Qctober 18, 1814; 

1814 Oct. 13 M New Haven. I left your city at 3 o 1 clock on the 
9th instant in the sloop SUSAN, Captain Idles, for 
New Haven. Next day at 9 o’clock a.m,, we passed 
two New Haven Packets for New York, about a mile 
apart. , In their wake, within half a mile, was 
apparently a Long Island wood sloop, which hailed 


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us at about 40 y%rds di^trine 0 , and immedi ately 
bore dc> r ■ upen w& and baai;.;.-.' 6 m' s 3 f 6 pon y,n« 
quarter'deck vuth. forty nee V witn nui- ketS, . 

bayonets end swords.. ‘Shy,:. rn ; 3 d""Go bo t*v ar to 
the POK NS/ T.riga’to,, CAp.TWR: pf.. wa .1 1' ougnteen 
pounder, 2 fours’ and 60 men/'corric.nded. by-Lieutenant 
Smart, whose behavior was very civil. We were all 
driven below and our ammunitions demanded and given * 
up. W.e had 2 four.pounders, a few muskets, 16 
passengers, the Captain and 4 men, 300' barrels of 
flour, 15 barrels of gun powder and considerable 
quantity of dry goods, paints, oils and other valu- 1 - * 
able property. On the 11th, at 6 a.m., when I went , 
on deck the English 18 gun Brig DISPATCH, Captain 
James Galloway, was in company with her two boats, 
the tender and one sloop, all in pursuit of the 1 
Revenue Cutter EAGLE,. Captain Lee/ of 'this port with 
/ery light breezed from the southeast. The boats, 
about 8 o’clock returned to the Brig, having been 
beaten off by the Cutter. The Brig and the tender 
were not able to prevent the Cutter from running 
on shore near Negroes Head,.Long island. The Revenue 
Cutter was .stripped'of' her ; sails arid rigging-and her 
guns dragged.up a high bluff arid ; thore fought against 
the Brig and tender until uwo o’clock with bravery. 

The Brig opened her fnre about 9 0 ’clock upon the 
Cutter and our people.upon the hill, and about two 
o ’ clock, the cutter’s ‘masts v/ere. cut away-and her 
hull appeared to us in the slot o' (about one' mile' 
from the Brig) to. be a'wreck. 'We’were then taken 
onboard the Brig by her barges. 

The Captain- paroledme and at 9 a .m. on the 12th, 
made sail for" New Haven t We were, put on shore at 
Guilford at 2 p.m, I have, ho certain knowledge re¬ 
lating to the fate of the men on board the"-Cutter, 
or the militia who assembled on the heights. It 
. is believed that they have received little or no 
injury. The shot from the shore generally fell 
short of the Brig; one went through her jib and ’ 
some were thrown considerable b-.yo'nd her. 

(New York Evening Post, October 14, 1814). 

During the .engagement between the Cutter EAGLE • 
and the epemy, the follow pg took place which is 
worthy.of notice. Having expended all the wadding 
>. of the -four, pounders on tiib hill, during the warmest 
of the firing, .several'of ’th‘e Crew volunteered and 1 





and went on board, the Cutter to obtain more; At this 
moment the masts were shot away, when the brave vol¬ 
unteers erected a flag upon her stern; this was soon 
shot away* but was immediately Replaced by a heroic 
tar, amidst the cheers of his undaunted comrades, 
which was returned by a whole broadside from the 
enemy. When the crew of the Cutter had expended 
all their large shot and fixed ammunition, they 
tore up the log book to make cartridges and returned 
the enemy*s small shot which lodged in the hull. 

The Cutter was armed with only 6 guns, 4 four 
pounders and 2 twos with plenty of muskets and 
about 50 men. The enemy being gone and provisions 
scarce the volunteers from this city left Captain 
Lee and his crew and arrived here on Thursday even¬ 
ing the 13th instant, in a sloop from Long Island, 
Captain Davis, from this city, was slightly wounded 
in the knee by a' stone impelled by a 3.2 pound shot 
which struck near him. We have since learned that 
Captain Lee succeeded in getting off the Cutter and 
was about to remove.her to a place of safety when 
the enemy returned and took possession of her. She 
was greatly injured, but it is expected that the 
enemy will be able to refit her to annoy us in the 
Sound, 

(New York Evening Post, October 18, 1314).” 

One of the most notable actions fought on the water in the War of 
1812, took place in the York River, near Chesapeake Bay on the night 
of June 12, 1813, between the cutter SURVEYOR, commanded by Captain 
William Travis, and forces from the British man-of-war NARCISSUS. The 
SURVEYOR carried 15 men and was armed with 6 twelve pounder carronades. 

The attack was made upon this little vessel by the barges of the Bri¬ 
tish frigate NARCISSUS, which carried to the conflict 50 men. The 
enemy was discovered by Travis when within 150 yards of the cutter, but 
the latter f s guns could not be brought to bear, so that .the def^tise was 
necessarily confined to small arms, ! To each of the SURVEYOR’S crew was 
given two muskets with instructions not to fire until the enemy wore 
within pistol range, ^he engagement was of brief duration, and the 
enemy, by dint of superior force, carried the cutter by boarding, with 
a loss of 3 killed and 7 wounded, while of the crew of the SURVEYOR, 5 
were wounded and the rest made prisoners of.war. 

On the day following this action the British Commander returned 
Caotain Travis’ sword with a letter which read ”Your gallant and des¬ 
perate attempt to defend your vessel against more than double your 
number, on the night of the 12th inst*, excited such admiration.on 
the part of your opponents as I have seldom witnessed and induced me 
to return you the sword you had so nobly used, in testimony of mine.” 


9 - 


SUPPRESSION With the cessation of hostilities in 1815, 

OF PIRACY William Doughty, naval constructor, was asked 

to design three new classes of cutters, 
arranged according to size as 31? 5l, and 79 
tons* * These ships were built on the extreme Baltimore clipper model 
with very high stern, and relatively low bow. The ALABAMA and LOUISIANA 
were built in 1819 on the $1 ton model. On August 31, 1819? these two 
cutters, on their way to their stations in the Gulf, fought with a 
Mexican privateer BRAVO, commanded by one La Farge, a lieutenant of the 
notorious Jean LaFitte, who had resumed his piratical occupation after 
rendering distinguished service at New Orleans, and captured her after 
a slight engagement. Later, these two cutters, still working together 
destroyed Patterson*s town on Breton Island, a notorious pirate*s den, 
practically putting an end to organized piracy on the Gulf coast, though 
piratical craft from Mexico, Central and South America, subsequently 
made incursions on that coast. In 1822, the ALABAMA took three slavers, 
while the LOUISIANA, in conjunction xALth a U. S. and British battleship 
captured five pirate vessels. 


ANTI-NULLIFICATION 

Operations - 


SOUTk CAROLINA 1832 

FIRST CALLED 

REVENUE CUTTER 
SERVICE 1832 


During the attempt to nullify the laws-relating 
to the collection of the revenue from imports 
by the State of South Carolina in 1832, five 
vessels of the Revenue Cutter Service, as it was 
then first called, were ordered to Charleston 

harbor with instructions “to take possession of 
any vessel arriving from a foreign port, and 
defend her against any attempt to dispossess the 
Customs Officers of her custody until all the requirements of the law 
have been complied with." President Jackson reinforced these instruc¬ 
tions with the statement that "if a single drop of blood shall be shed 
there in opposition to the laws of the United States, I will hang the 
first man I can lay my hands on, upon the first tree I can reach,” 


The silent influence exerted by the presence of the Revenue Cutter 
fleet, however, was a large factor in the solution of the difficulties 
which menaced peace and Henry Clay*s compromise act of 1833 removed all 
immediate 'threat of nullification. 


BEGINNING OF Between 1825 and 1832 a number of naval officers, 

SERVICE PROMOTIONS because of Slew promotion and lack of ships' in 

the Navy, were commissioned in the Revenue Cutter 

* Service, Those officers did not fit into the 
Service, however, iheir training was different and, for a naval officer 
they had many unusual duties to perform. Many of them were not satis- * 
fied to take orders from Collectors of Customs. Accordingly, Louis 
McLane, Secretary of the Treasury in 1832, sent a circular letter to 
officers of the Revenue Cutter Service in which he emphasized-that the 
two services - Navy and Revenue Cutter - were to be kept separate and 
distinct in the future and that all commissions of naval officers in 


- 10 - 












the Cutter S0rv3.ee were to be revoked as of'April 30* 1832. "With a 
view to greater efficiency in the Cutter Service in the future," he 
added, "vacancies will be filled by promotion from among the officers 
in that service, when that shall-be found preferable to other appoint¬ 
ments, having regards to fitness as well as seniority." Thus in 1832, 
the Revenue Cutter Service started on another phase of its career 
with 92 commissioned and warrant officers and 18 vessels. 

THE FIRST ' Its vessels were now being built more like the 
CQMlt\NDi\HT naval schooner type of 1798 than the pilot- 

boat style of I8l£. Larger ships were needed . 
and they required trained officers and men - 
persons who had grown up in the merchant service. This latter group 
of men now became predominant in the cutter establishment, men who 
had served in neither the Revolution nor the War of 1812, but men 
with a merchant service background. One of those became in I8I4.3 
the first military commandant,. Alex V. Fraser. His background was 
in the East-India trade, and being a Democrat, Jackson had. given him 
a commission as Second Lieutenant in 1832 aboard the ALERT. It was 
Fraser*s duty, when the ALERT proceeded to. Charleston, to board the 
sugar ships from Havana and compel them to anchor under the gun& of 
the cutter and Fort Moultrie, and to discharge the sugar, which w T as 
then stored in the fort, until the duty was paid by the consignees.* 

Fraser*s rise in the service was rapid. After three years spent on 
one of the then newly authorized winter cruises he was able to show • 
in detail the records and actual tracks of his cruising in search of 
distressed vessels. His appointment as .Captain came as a result of 
judicious use of these statistics with the New York Board of Under¬ 
writers and others* As a result of a criticism by a Congressional * 
Committee of the administration of both the Lighthouse establishment, 
which had been under the direct control of the secretary of the 
Treasury since August 7, 1789* when the Federal Government accepted 
title to the twelve lights then in existence, and of the Revenue 
Cutter Service, Secretary Spencer on 12 April, 18U3, offered Fraser 
the position of Commandant in charge of the Revenue-Marine Division 
of the Treasury Department. On February 19, 18U5>, the lighthouses 
were transferred to the Revenue-Marine Division. 

SEMINOLE WAR Meanwhile, the Seminole War Lad broken out in 

1836 ’ 1836 and eight revenue cutters cooperated with 

the Army and Navy in blockading rivers, carry¬ 
ing dispatches, transporting troops and ammuni¬ 
tion, and providing landing parties for the defense of the settlements 
menaced by the Indians. These were the Revenue Cutters DALLAS, .WASHING¬ 
TON, DEXTER, JEFFERSON, JACKSON, MADISON, CAMPBELL, and VAN BUREN.. "Their 
prompt and helpful cooperation with the Array," an officer under whom they 


- 11 - 





operated wrote, "has called forth the highest commendation from command¬ 
ing generals> w*jo take occasion to eulogize the service rendered by 
the cutters*" 

MEXICAN WAR Eleven cutters participated in the Mexican War 

] of 18U6 - 18U8 which followed - the schooners 

- FORWARD, EWING, VAN BUREN, WOLCOTT, WOODEURN, 

, and MORRIS and the steamers McLANE, LEGARE, . 
SPENCER, BIBB, and POLK. These took an active part principally in 
cooperation with the Armies under Taylor and Scott* Some of these 
vessels, notably the FORWARD and McLANE served in cooperation with the 
Navy, in the fleet commanded by Commodore Conner. In the squadron 
of Commodore M. C, Perry, who was later to open Japan, at the capture 
of Prontera and Tabasco, the FORWARD took a brilliant part, so much so 
that the Commodore was moved to say in his official report: "I am gra¬ 
tified to bear 'witness to the valuable services of the Revenue Schooner 
FORWARD, commanded by Captain H. Bo Nomcs,,and to the skill and gal¬ 
lantry of her officers and men." Both the FORWARD and McLANE partici¬ 
pated in amphibious operations at the mouth of the Tobasco River in 
l8U7o The McLANE ran aground, however, and had to bo extricated by 
the Navy. For the first time in war several of the cutters operated 
as a unit under command of their own officers. 

CALIFORNIA From the end of the Mexican War until the Navy* s 

181+9 Paraguay Expedition in 1058, the cutters were 

busy hunting slavers. When Commandant Fraser 
was relieved as head of the Revenue Marine Bureau 
in 18U8, he immediately took command of the Brig LAWRENCE for hdr trip 
around the Horn to the West Coast. As a result of the Mexican War we 
had taken over California and the revenue laws had been extended to the 
new territory. The discovery of gold in the next year and the inrush 
of the i*9ers, made the extension of the Revenue Cutter Service to the 
west coast of paramount significance© The officers whom Fraser took 
with him on the long trip around the Horn had not come through the 
hard school of seamanship that he had experienced. While he had made 
26 previous trips across the equator, three of his five lieutenants had 
had no experience at sea and had never even been aboard a square-rigger 
until they sailed on the LAVJRENCE. Fraser could not trust them in 
charge of the deck and was compelled to keep their watches himself. In 
a very real sense, therefore, the LAWRENCE was the first school ship 
of the service. The LAWRENCE took almost a year to reach San Francisco* 
Immediately on her arrival at the Golden Gate, some of the officers 
acted as if they had just been released from jail. By the time the 
LAWRENCE reached San Francisco, prices had skyrocketed so that the offi¬ 
cers could not live on their service salaries. The Executive Officer and 
the officer next in rank left ship as soon as she anchored, to accept 
private positions at salaries three or four times that of Captain.Fraser*s. 
At one time the only other officer aboard whom Fraser could trust with any 


- 12 





ship’s affairs or with boarding duties was Second Lieutenant Pierce* 
Fraser regarded the Third Lieutenants as cadets and never referred to 
them as officers* 

San Francisco was not an easy station in 18^9 and 18 50. Often 
there were five or six hundred vessels riding at anchor. There was 
great excitement and many insubordinate and lawless crews. There 
were as yet no civil tribunals established to help the Revenue 
Cutter Service in its work of law enforcement. Fraser and his few 
aidesworked night and day enforcing the Revenue Laws, and helping ship 
masters suppress mutiny and violence. 

The LAWRENCE, was lost in a gale when under the command of Captain 
Ottinger, who relieved Fraser when the latter returned to New York. 

To replace the lost brig, the MARCY was sent to the West Coast in 
185U. Illustrative of the low morale of the Service just prior to the 
Civil War, a First Lieutenant on the MARCY had allotted 360 a month of 
salary to his wife, a New London girl. On-, arrival in San Francisco in 
the spring of 18^U> he became quite homesick for the joys of connubial 
bliss, so he shipped' east on a steamer leaving California on the lf>th 
of April. He had been granted only a day’s leave so he was definitely 
AWOL. Having discovered that all was well with his wife'the Lieutenant 
had a^change of heart. On June 5, 185U, he wrote to the "Honorable 
Secretary of the Treasury" that "upon due reflection" he had decided 
to return to San Francisco and "to duty on that coast." He concluded 
his note with "if same does not meet the views of the Department - 
please cohsider this my resignation, - any communication will roach me 
. at San Francisco, whore I shall be ready to return to duty or not as 
the Department thinks proper." Either he had very strong political; 
friends in Washington or the Service was definitely at its lowest ebb. 
The reply of the Department fairly groveled: "The Department will 
overlook, in this instance" it reads, "the offence of quitting your 
ship without authority." Nowadays such disregard of the regulations 
would, of course, never be tolerated* 

PARAGUAYAN In 1855, the Paraguayan Government had resented 

EXPEDITION' a United States surveying expedition aboard the 

1858 WATER WITCH and the natives had attacked her as 

she was making her way along the Parana River* 
The vessel was hit ten times in the hull, the 
steering gear disabled and the same shot killed the man at the wheel. 
The U. 5. gradually Worked up a spirit of resentment against this 
"outrage" and the incident caused much discussion in- Congress. To im¬ 
press 'the Latin-Americans, a fleet of 15 ships with 1,361 men and 291 
mariners, stood out to sea in October, 1858. The HARRIET LANE, newest 
revenue cutter, a side wheeler, cooperated with,the Navy in this, ex¬ 
pedition. The little fleet received positive instructions to wage an 
undeclared war on the natives of Paraguay if they refused to consent 
to allow free trade on the Paraguay and Parana Rivers. Backed by this 
threat the commissioner in charge of treaty negotiations had no diffi¬ 
culty in negotiating a treaty'of "amity and commerce" with Paraguay 
on February U, 1859, which provided for "perfect peace and sincere 
friendship" between the two governments while free trading rights on 
the rivers were granted U. S. merchant.vessels. Indicative of the 


13 - 






manner -in which this ’’perfect peace” was negotiated were the limits 
set on ratifications: Paraguay had twelve days to think it over; 
the TJ. S. could take 1$ months# The HARRIET LANE was complimented 
by Commodore Wm. B e Shubrick, USN, on the efficient way in which she 
assisted some -of the larger warships grounded in the shallow river. 
Returning to the U. S. in the spring of 18£? the HARRIET LANE patrolled 
from the northern boundary of Florida to the state’s southern tip to 
prevent violation of the slave trade law n The approach of the Civil 
War necessitated the transfer of the HARRIET LANE back to the Navy 
Department and it is claimed that she fired the first shot in the 
Civil War© The steamer NASHVILLE, lying off Charleston bar and wait¬ 
ing to run just before the bombardment of Fort Sumter in April* 1861, 
refused to show her colors» Captain Faunce of the HARRIET LANE ordered 
a shot thrown across the NASHVILLE*s bows and "it had the desired 
effect.” 

CIVIL WAR One decision that now had to be made, and made 

"ld'61-65” quickly, concerned the allegiance of the officers 

and men aboard the cutters in southern ports. 
Captain James J. Morrison, aboard the LEWIS CAbS, 
stationed at Mobile, decided to cast his lot with the confederacy, and 
turned the ship over to the state authorities. Third Lieutenant Charles 
F. Shoemaker, later to become Commandant.of the Revenue Service, deter¬ 
mined to remain loyal to the Union 0 Making his way as best he could, 
with his brother officers and the entire crew, he finally reached the 
North. 


Handicapped by the transfer of the HARRIET LANE to the Navy and 
the loss of several cutters in other southern, ports* the Revenue Cutter 
Service relied on several purchased tugs to carry on patrol duty in the 
Chesapeake and Potomac 0 Their main function was to prevent mail and 
supplies passing from Maryland to Virginia, a duty in which they ren¬ 
dered ’’incalculable service” to the cause of the North. The Treasury 
Department also bought a number of other small craft for work in the 
harbors of Boston, New York, Hampton Roads and service along the coast. 
Two sea-going steamers, the CUYAHOGA and MIAMI, the one a former 
Mexican man-of-war captured in the War with Mexico, and the other a 
yacht, were bought from private owners, and soon joined in the block¬ 
ade, actively pursuing several southern privateers. Mr. E. A. Stevens 
of Hoboken built a steamer, named it the STEVENS and presented it to 
the Government. She participated in the raid on Drury*s Bluff and in 
several other engagements. As the war continued, the Treasury Depart¬ 
ment built six new screw-steamers, each bearing six guns. The ships 
possessed much speed and were useful in chasing down privateers. A 
dockyard and depot for the Treasury’s Naval Force was established on 
Staten Island in l86iu By November, 186U, -in addition to these six 
steamers and five that had been purchased, the service had three 
paddle wheel steamers and ll; sailing vessels. 


- Hi - 




The HARRIET LANE, not yet permanently transferred to the Navy, 
was not only part of the expedition to relieve Fort Sumter, having 
been present during the bombardment in April, 1861, but also partici¬ 
pated in the attack on Fort Clark and Fort Hatteras, blockade-running 
bases on Hatteras Inlet, whose capture was the first Union victory. 

Soon after this, the vessel was permanently transferred to the Navy, 
acting as Porter’s flagship until captured at Galveston. After that 
she served as a confederate ship. 

The MIAMI was Lincoln’s personal transport and saw action at 
Willoughby’s point; the FORWARD rendered support and assistance to 
General Butler at Annapolis, Maryland; the NAUGATUCK accompanied 
the MONITOR on its battle with the MERPJMAC; took part in the attack 
on Sewell’s point; led the naval fleet up the James River and parti¬ 
cipated in the bombardment of Drury’s Bluff on May 15, 1862. The 
NEWAHA rendered efficient service to the Army and Navy on the South 
Atlantic coast, received on board Gen a Slocum at Fort McAllister, 
Savannah, Ga., just from his ’’March to the Sea” and convoyed him to 
the naval fleet below. The FORWARD, BROWN, AGASSIZ, TOUCY, and 
ANTIETAM rendered important services in the waters of North Carolina, 
while the JACKSON, HERCULES, RELIANCE, TIGER, and ALLEN cooperated 
with the naval forces in the gunboat flotilla in the Chesapeake; and 
during all this time the cutters were also busily engaged in collect¬ 
ing badly needed revenues. 

The men who reinvigorated the Service after the Civil War were 
Secretary of the Treasury George S. Boutwell and Sumner I. Kimball. 
Despite the interest in the growing Middle West, Boutwell decided that 
the Revenue Cutter Service was worth rescuing from inefficient opera¬ 
tions, careless expenditure of funds, and public apathy. A commission 
appointed by him in 1869, advocated the use of ’smaller vessels and 
lower operating costs. To reduce costs, the' most obvious method, 
both in business and government, has always been to reduce the number 
of men employed* Kimball, to whom was intrusted as Commandant the 
carrying out of the commission’s recommendations, reduced enlisted 
personnel from 1,050 to 860. The officers had to stand trial for 
their official lives, as the commission had discovered very low profess¬ 
ional standards in the service and an inefficiency among the officers 
that increased the cost to the taxpayers. Seven out of nineteen cap¬ 
tains and thirty three out of one hundred and three lieutenants failed 
to meet the standards set up by a board of experienced captains under 
the presidency of Captain John Faunce. A new set of regulations for 
the service was issued in 1871. Those provided for a tightly knit, 
efficient service. Expenditures must be authorized fbom Washington; 
reports and inventories had to be made regularly from the cutter to 
the Revenue Marine Bureaui Cutters were .regularly inspected. A 
really serious attempt was made to do away with political pull in 
making appointments and in securing stations. All candidates for 


other than the lowest grades of officers were "required to pass a 
satisfactory physical examination and a competitive professional one 
and must have a fixed number of years* practical service 

The Revenue Cutter Service now realized that it must establish 
its own "School of Instruction." Political appointments had produced 
a mediocre organization; some good men had become officers in this 
manner, but no standards had been agreed upon as to the correct type 
of man for an officer. Kimball, Chief of the Revenue Marine Bureau, 
was a civilian. Probably much of the stimulation for the idea of 
cadetships stemmed from 'a sort of "permanent" board of elder officers 
in the service, who were always called to Washington during this 
period when any decisions were to be made. The Act of July 31* 1876, 
provided that "hereafter upon the occurring of a vacancy in the grade 
of third lieutenant in the Revenue Marine Service, the Secretary of 
the Treasury may appoint a cadet, not less than 18 or more than 25 
years of age, with rank next below that of third lieutenant, and who 
shall not be appointed to a higher grade until he shall have served a 
satisfactory probationary term of two years and passed the examination 
required by the regulations of said service; and upon the promotion of 
such cadet another may be appointed in his stead; but the whole number 
of third lieutenants and cadets shall at no time exceed the number of 
third lieutenants now authorized by law." 

To solve the question of how these cadets were to be appointed 
•the "permanent" board assembled in Washington on December 12, 1876, 
and held the first examination for cadets in the service. The first 
class of cadets was, thereupon, appointed in December, 1876. The 
old schooner J. C. DOBBIN was put in shape, under the first "Superin¬ 
tendent" Captain J. S. Henriques, for them to use as a school ship. 

The training of the first class of cadets began on May 2$, 1877, when 
the DOBBIN, with nine cadets, three officers, one surgeon, six warrant 
officers, and 17 men in the crew was towed down the Chesapeake Bay 
from Baltimore by the cutter EWING. On reaching Point Lookout the 
DOBBIN began four and a half months of Intermittent cruising, in¬ 
cluding tacks between the U. S. and Bermuda. The school ship anchored 
at Provincetovm on June 29, 1877, whence it made its way to Portland, 
Maine, and on July 2);, sailed to the Azores. 

The DOBBIN was only a stop-gap and the Department soon began 
serious.planning for a brand-new ship, especially built for the cadets. 
The designs called for a bark of 250 tons to cost not more .than $1*0,000, 
completely fitted out for her duty. This vessel, the CHASE, became the 
home of the School of Instruction of the Revenue Cutter Service in the 
late summer of 1878. She was 106 feet long, 25 feet beam and ca.rried 
a battery of four broadside guns. The cadets lived in the steerage" 
which before the ship was remodeled in 1895, contained six staterooms 
with two berths each, a wash-stand and clothing lockers. 


- 16 - 


From 1877 on, the idea of a definite training organization within 
the service never left the Revenue Cutter Service, except for one short 
period. Each class as it went through the School of Instruction or 
its successor, the Coast Guard Academy, developed an esprit de coi’ps 
that has had an incalculable effect on the service as a whole. 

In 1890, however, the Revenue Cutter Service reached a new low. 
Both officers and men suffered severe discrimination as compared to’ 
the treatment accorded Army and Navy personnel. For the first time 
in the history of the service, two Secretaries of the Treasury favored 
amalgamation with the Navy. Secretary Foster and Secretary Windom 
waged an active campaign for the transfer. They regarded the School 
of Instruction as an unnecessary expense* The CHASE suspended opera¬ 
tions. For three years vacancies in the grade of third lieutenant of 
the Revenue Cutter Service were filled with graduates of Annapolis* 

This infiltration quickly called public attention to the differences 
between the two services. Anti-Navy feeling in the Middle West opposed 
the transfer, Y/ith the new Democratic administration of President 
Cleveland the commotion subsided. The CHASE was reconditioned and new 
classes were started. Secretary Carlisle of the Treasury Department . 
decided that vacancies in the engineer - corps of the jervice should be 
filled only by graduates of the leading engineering institutions such 
as M.I.T., Stevens, and Cornell. The CHASE definitely established 
v/inter quarters at Curtis Bay, South Baltimore, Maryland, The curri¬ 
culum became highly technical, - seamanship, navigation, mathematics, 
astronomy, law, tactics and*hygiene. In 190? the CHASE was superseded 
by the ITASCA, formerly a Naval Academy Training Ship. In 1910 the 
school was moved to New London, Connecticut, and Fort Trumbull was 
transferred to the Treasury bv' the Wfer Department, This became the 
site of the Academy Until new buildings were occupied up the Thames 
River in 1932. 

THE LIFE SAVING In 1783’ there was organized the Massachusetts 

SERVICE Humane Society patterned after the Royal 

Humane Society of England which dated from 
177li and followed a broad policy of relief to 
persons on vessels in distress. This organisation established the first 
lifeboat station at Cohasset, Mass., in 1807. Boats were manned on a 
voluntary basis just as volunteer fire departments function in many 
towns today. 

It was not until . 181^7 that Congress made the first appropriation 
for saving of life from shore, and this, after two years had elapsed, 
was turned over 1 to the collector of customs at Boston to be used in 
acquiring boat houses and equipment on Cape Cod for.the Massachusetts 
Humane Society, After a series ‘of wrecks on the coasts of Long Island 
and New Jersey, totaling some 300 in nine years, an appropriation of 


- 17 - 




$10,000 was made in 18U8 for the purpose of "providing surf boats, 
rockets, carronades, and other apparatus for the better preservation 
of life and property from shipwrecks on the coast xxxx between Sandy 
Hook and Egg Harbor,” The funds were expended in cooperation with 
insurance underwriters under the supervision of the Captain of the 
Revenue-Marine Service, and eight boathouses, each about 16 by 28 
feet, were constructed. These were the first stations built with 
federal funds. One still, stands at Spermaceti Cove, on Sandy Hook, 

New Jersey, 

During the following year, 1814.9, fourteen more boathouses were 
provided by Congressional funds along the New Jersey and Long Island 
coasts, the latter being spent under the direction of the Life- 
Saving Benevolent Association of New York. Following this, more boats 
and equipment more provided by Congress to be used by volunteers,' but 
there was no accounting for the property furnished. After the boat¬ 
houses were built and equipped by the Government, its responsibility 
ceased. Then in 185U the appointment of keepers at $200 per year was 
authorized and more, appropriations made for the support of' stations. 
Improvements, made as a result of reports made by officers of the 
Revenue-Marine Service, were spasmodic and temporary. Finally in 
18?1, Congress authorized the Secretary of the Treasury to employ 
experienced surf men at these stations for such periods as he deemed 
proper, A governmentaily supervised system began to take the place 
of the loosely administered volunteer system. 

In an article on "Life-Saving Stations" by Rebecca Harding 
Davis in Lippincott’s Magazine, Vol. XVII, p. 305 (1876) an interest¬ 
ing light is shed upon the forces which must have motivated the con¬ 
tinuing interest of Congress in providing funds for these stations. 
These forces were influenced by what were known as the "Jersey 
• wreckers." Asked about the operations of the Barnegat pirates "in 
old times" drawing vessels ashore by false lights and plundering the 
ship-wrecked people a fisherman replied? "Well, Sir, them stories is 
onjust, the men as is called Barnegat pirates are not us fishermen- 
never were; they’re from the main-colliers and seen - as come down 
to a wrack, and they will have something to kerry home when they’re 
kept up all night. They do their share of stealin’, I’ll confess; 
but from Sandy Hook to Cape May it’s innocent to what is done on 
Long Island, No man or woman was ever robbed on this beach till they 
was dead. Of course, I don’t mean their trunks and sech, but not the 
body. The Long Islanders cut off fingers of livin’ people for rings, 
but the Barnegat men never touch the body till it’s dead, No Sir." 

As a result of Congressional action, the Life-Saving Service 
was set up within the Revenue-Marine Service, of which Sumner I. 
Kimball was chief, in 1871. Kimball received $200,000 from Congress, 
ten times as much as had ever before been appropriated for life¬ 
saving. More stations were built and by I 87 U they extended to many 


- 18 - 


New England points, to the southern part of the Atlantic Coast, to 
the Great Lakes, and the Pacific Coast. Life-saving medals were 
authorized, personnel reorganized, beach patrols and signals.intro¬ 
duced, and the technique of using the breeches buoy developed. 

Regular inspection and reconditioning of equipment was provided for, 
Masters of American ships were required to notify the collectors of 
customs at their home districts of the nature and pfobable cause of 
casualties involving loss of life, serious personal injury, or sub¬ 
stantial loss of property. These casualty reports are still made and 
have always provided an important basis in determining the location, 
not only of life saving stations, but of lighthouses and other aids 
to navigations, as well. 

In 18?8 the service 'was established as a separate bureau in the 
Treasury Department, with a general superintendent of its own. Kim¬ 
ball left the Revenue-Iiiarine Division to become head of the Life- 
Saving Service on its.formal establishment and served continuously 
until the Act- of January 28, 1915, again consolidated tse two services 
to form the Coast Guard. While the services were separated, provision 
was made for the inspection,'drilling and disciplining of the crews, of 
life saving stations by officers of the Revenue Cutter Service and in 
190U as many as fourteen officers of the Revenue Cutter Service were 
on duty with the Life Saving Service. The efficiency of the Life- 
Saving Service at that time was attributed, in fact, in all that re¬ 
lated to its technical.features, to the energetic and capable officers 
of the Revenue Cutter Service who had made the inspections, formulated 
the drills, and practiced and drilled the life-saving crews. 

The story of the Life Saving,Service is a story of daring apd 
skill, Coastguardsmen assigned to life saving stations learn early 
the "Regulations say you have to go out, but they don’t sry you have 
to come back," Statistics show' that through the combined efforts of 
the Life Saving Service and the Revenue Cutter Service, 203*609 lives 
had been saved in the seventy years between 1871 and 19hl* Property 
valued at $1,781;,736,121. was saved from "Davy Jones’ Locker." In 
addition succor was afforded to lj.8,023 persons, A little arithmetic 
will indicate that this means 2,868 lives saved, $25,137,157 worth 
of property, and 676 persons afforded succor, on the average* for 
each of these seventy years. 

LIFE SAVING Only men of a special breed can take rescues in 

UNDER COAST GUARD their stride, and. as a good su'rfman requires, parti- 
1915 - 1966 cular qualities and abilities, be'st expressed, per- 

‘ haps, as boatmanship rather than seamanship. The 
life-saving branch of tlie.Coast Guard was until 
recently, even after the amalgamation of 1915;, administered almost 
entirely as. a separate unit. While specialization lias since been 
broken down, there has been no relaxation of training and one of the 


- 19 - 





most valuable contributions of the Coast Guard in its development 
of men is that its men are unsurpassed anywhere in the handling of 
small boats. On January 1, 1943, the Coast Guard had 202 active 
lifeboat stations and 62 inactive. By June 30, 1946, this number 
had been reduced to 189, only 59 of which were active on 23 August, 
1946, 32 in limited status, 92 in caretaker status and o altogether 
closed*. Shortage of personnel during the period of demobilization 
and deployment had thus brought this once splendid facility for 
maritime safety temporarily to a low state of activity. 

Replacement of wooden vessels by steel ships indicated that 
wrecks would take place farther offshore than-formerly, and that 
more time would be available for rescue.. The use of the breeches 
buoy, designed to bring survivors ashore from wrecks comparatively 
close ashore, was expected to show a decline. The newer stations, 
therefore, have been built on inlets in order to take advantage 
of the latest equipment. There have been more lifeboats and 
picket boats and fewer pulling boats used in recent times. There 
is a lookout tower at every station and a 75 foot signal.tower. 

All stations are part of the chain of coastal communications, and 
so are able speedily to report disasters and to summon assistance. 

In recent years complements have been doubled to sixteen or more 
surfmen under command, usually, of a warrant officer. 

During World War II, the life boat and light stations of the 
Coast Guard became the nuclei! around which tjie Beach Patrol was 
created. This force of 24,000 officers and men patrolled some 
50,000 miles of our coasts. In addition to stationary lookouts 
and foot and vehicle patrols, with small boat forces at inlets, 
mounted patrolmen and sentry dogs were extensively used. It was 
a young Coast Guardsman, John C. Cullen, Seaman 2/c, who in the 
summer of 1942, discovered Nazi saboteurs landing on the beach at 
Amagansett, L, I,, and sounded the alarm that led to their eventual 
capture. This incident gave the necessary impetus to the organiza¬ 
tion of the Beach Patrol that kept our shores under vigilant and 
thorough surveillance until all danger of invasion had passed. 

BERING SEA PATROL It was in 1867 that we acquired Alaska from 
1867 - 1946 Russia by purchase. The Revenue Cutter LINCOLN 

was the first American vessel to arrive there. 
Regular Revenue Cutter patrol work in the.Arctic 
region began as early as 1880, when the .cutter CORWIN was assigned 
to general police work in the Bering Sea. From the very beginning, 
therefore, Alaska became the peculiar responsibility of the Coast 
Guard, It was on guard in Alaskan waters from early May until late 
December of every year, rendering aid to shipping, caring for the 
shipwrecked, and" assisting the unfortunate aqd destitute natives to 


- 20 - 



return to thcdr homes, after they had been driven ashore or on to 
other islands, by storm, while fishing,' Public Health surgeons de¬ 
tailed to the cutters which formed the Bering Sea Patrol prescribed 
for and aided the sick, treating thousands of cases each year* Hun¬ 
dreds of shipwrecked American whalers were rescued and brought home 
to the United States, 

There was the memorable cruise of the cutter BEAR, the same ship 
which.served in the Revenue Cutter Service 41 years and was later to 
carry Byrd to Antarctica, which in the winter of 1897-8 was sent to 
the relief of whalers, caught in the Arctic Ocean, near.Cape Barrow, 
by an unexpectedly early freeze. The overland expedition from the 
BEAR, started from Nunivak Island on the Bering Sea, at the limit of 
the ice floes, and in the dead of the Arctic winter. It consisted of 
Lieutenant D, H, Jarvis', Lieutenant E. P, Bertholf (later. C 0 (X Coiimandant), 
and Surgeon Samuel J* Call among others. Their wearying mush through 
the snow covered, ice bound region that lay between them! and the ice 
bound whalers covered nearly two thousand miles. Starting on December 
17, 1897, they did not reach their destination at Point Barrow until 
March 29, 1898, They drove before them a herd of reindeer as food for 
the starving crews of the whalers congregated there, and brought to 
the survivors the cheering news that with the breaking of the ice in 
a few months the BEAR would arrive with an abundance of food and cloth¬ 
ing and take them back to civilization. On their arrival at'Point 
Barrow, Jarvis and his party found terrible conditions among the sur¬ 
viving whalers, but set to work. with indomitable energy and brought 
order out of chaos. When the BEAR finally got through on July 29, 
ninety-seven men were taken on board and transported to San Francisco, 

Every one of the officers and men who composed this expedition was a 
volunteer from Captain Francis Tuttle R.C.S. down. 

During the absence of the BEAR on this humane expedition the '■ 

Spanish-American War had been fought and won. This was all news'to the 
men of the Revenue Cutter Service when they reached Unalaska in the 
summer of 1898, homeward bound. 

The work of the Revenue Cutter Service and later of the Coast Guard 
in Alaskan waters is fraught with exposure and hard service incident to 
the life of the seafarer. The enforcement of law. and order, the pro¬ 
tection of the seal herd and salmon fisheries, the introduction of rein¬ 
deer from Siberia, the care and attention given the educational system 
of the Department.of the Interior and a thousand other duties faithfully 
executed on behalf of practically every Government Department, has typi¬ 
fied and glorified the service. 

SPANISH-AtlERICAN Hardly had the tocsin of the Spanish-American War 

WAR - 1898 sounded in 1898 when the Revenue Cutter McCULLOCH 

bound for San Francisco, by way of Europe was 


- 21 - 




overhauled at Singapore, by cable, and directed to report to Commodore 
George Dewey, commanding the Asiatic Fleet. The cutter made .a quick 
run to Hong Kong, joined Dewey, and accompanied him in his campaign 
against Manila. The cutter later brought to Hong Kong the first news 
of the victory at Manila Bay. 

In the Western Hemisphere the cutter HUDSON, at the battle of 
Cardenas on May 11, 1898, sustained the fight against the gun boats 
and shore batteries of the enemy, side by side with the Navy torpedo 
boat WINSLOW, and when Ensign Bagley and half the crew of the latter 
vessel had been killed and her commander wounded, rescued the vessel 
and the remainder of her crew from certain -destruction under the 
furious fire of the enemy’s guns. Of this action'the Secretary of 
the Navy wrote: "The rescue of the WINSLOW by the HUDSON was so 
‘gallantly done in the face of a mo-st galling fire, that First Lieutenant 
Frank H. Newcomb, R.C.S., commanding, his officers and men, deserve the 
warmest commendation. The WINSLOW was riddled with shell, disabled, 
helplessly drifting on to the beach and into the hands of the enuny, 
her captain wounded, her only other officer end half her crew killed, 
but the HUDSON courageously remained by her in the very center of -the 
hottest fire of the action, although in constant danger of going ashore 
on account of the shallow water, until finally a line was made fast to 
the WINSLOW, and the vessel towed out of range of the enemy’s guns*" 

President McKinley made the work of the McCULIOCH and HUDSON the 
subject qf a special message to Congress, in terms of high commendation 
and praise, and as a reward of merit in the case of Captain Hodgson of 
the McCULLOCH (there being no higher grade in the Revenue Cutter Service 
to which he could be promoted) recommended tha’t he be retired from 
active service on the full pay of his grade. He also recommended the 
bestowal of the gold medal of honor upon Lieutenant Newcomb of the 
HUDSON, and silver medals of honor to each of his officers with bronze 
medals to each of his crow. The only gold and silver medals bestowed 
by Congress for services during the Spanish-American War were those 
for officers of the Revenue Cutter Service. 

Cooperating with the Navy during this war were 13 Revenue Cutters 
carrying 61 guns, 98 officers, and 562 enlisted men, Eight of these 
were in Rear-Admiral Sampson’s fleet and on the Havana blockade; one 
in Dewey's fleet; and 4 cooperated with the Navy on the Pacific Coast. 
Three other cutters with 25 officers and 210 men were ordered into 
cooperation but the war closed before they could be equipped and gOLten 
to the front.* 

INTERNATIONAL The International Service of Ice Observation and 

ICE PATROL Ice Patrol, conducted principally off the Grand 

1912 - 1946 Banks of Newfoundland each year, was initiated 

by the U. S. in 1912, following the sinking of 


- 22 - 





the "TITANIC” by collision with an iceberg. The patrol was continued 
until January 20, 1914 , when a formal convention was signed at London 
by the principal maritime powers, prescribing a permanent and systematic 
patrol under specific conditions relating to its prosecution and main-! 
tenance. The Coast Guard has continued to conduct this patrol, the 
object of which is to locate icebergs and field ice nearest to the 
trans-Atlantic lanes of ocean travel, and to send out frequent mes¬ 
sages; giving the location of the dangerous ice, particularly such ice 
as may be in the immediate vicinity of the regular steamer lanes* As 
the result of this patrol, no serious accident had resulted, up to the 
time of the discontinuance of the patrol in 1941* from the former 
dreaded icebergs. The patrol was suspended when the U, S, entered the 
war in December, 1941, While intense submarine activity in the Western 
Atlantic in 1942 necessitated routing convoys through areas normally 
endangered by pack ice and icebergs, the establishing of bases in Green¬ 
land, Iceland, and the Canadian Arctic, brought ice areas under con¬ 
sideration that, prior to the war, had been of little concern. Because 
of urgent demand for vessels for convoy escort and anti-submarine 
patrol, none could be assigned to ice patrol. Merchant ships, formerly 
reporting ibe sighted, now moved in convoy and maintained radio silence. 
Allied planes and escort vessels supplied the major part of the informa¬ 
tion on ice conditions which was received 0 A Coast Guard detachment of 
personnel experienced in ice patrol work was detailed to Argentia- New¬ 
foundland, and acted as a clearing house for ice information gathered 
from all available sources. Only one collision with an iceberg occurred 
during this period. The British vessel SVEND.FOYNE was the victim of 
an iceberg collision on March 19, 1943, and 145 persons were rescued 
from the icy waters by Coast Guard and other craft before she sank. 

The International Ice Patrol was resumed in March, 1946, again under 
Coast Guard auspices. 

ESTABLISHMENT On April 4, 1912, President Taft sent to Congress 

OF COAST GUARD a message, transmitting, with his approval, a 

1915 report of the President’s Commission on Economy 

and Efficiency, This recommended the consolida¬ 
tion of the Life-Saving Service of the Treasury 
Department with the Bureau of Lighthouses, then in the Department of 
Commerce and Labor, There was also a report of the same commission 
proposing that the Revenue Cutter Service be abolished and its functions 
and equipment allocated "among other services requiring the use of marine 
craft," notably the Lighthouse Service, the Bureau of Fisheries of the 
Commerce 'and Labor Department and the Navy Department, Neither of thes-e 
proposals was adopted by the Congress, Instead, on June 5, 1912, Senator 
Chase E. Townsend of Michigan introduced a bill to consolidate the Life 
Saving Service and the Revenue-Cutter Service, both of the Treasury 
Department, into a single service of the Treasury, under the name of 
the COAST GUARD. This measure became law on January 2d, 1915. 


- 23 - 





WORLD WAR I Following the passage of this act and during the 

1917 - IB tense days immediately prior to our entrance into 

World War I, arrangements were made for the inte¬ 
gration of the newly created Coast Guard with the 
Navy in the event of hostilities. Then on the morning of April 6, 1917, 
a dispatch was sent to each unit of the Coast Guard, stating succinctly 
"Plan One, Acknowledge." This meant we were at war with Germany and 
the Coast Guard immediately went into action. The Navy was thereby 
augmented by fifteen cruising cutters and over 200 commissioned officers 
and nearly 5,000 warrant officers and enlisted men. Coast Guardsmen 
were entrusted not only with the hunting of submarines and raiders, but 
with guarding the transports of troops, our most precious cargo c Of 
138 commissioned line officers, 24 commanded combatant ships of the 
Navy in the European war zone, 5 commanded combatant ships attached to 
the American Patrol detachment in the Caribbean, and 23 commanded com¬ 
batant chips attached to naval districts. Five were in charge of large 
training camps and 6 were in aviation, two commanding air stations. 

' Squadron 2, Division 6, of the patrol forces of the Atlantic Fleet 
was composed of the cutters 0SSIPEE, SENECA, YAMACRAW, ALGONQUIN, MANNING, 
and TAMPA. These were based at Gibralter, oerforming escort duty between 
that port and the British Isles, as well as in the Mediterranean. Other 
large cutters operated in the vicinity of the Azores, off Nova Scotia, 
in the Caribbean, and in the coastal waters of the United States. 

At 2:45 on the morning of April 28, 1918, the British naval sloop 
COWSLIP, out of Gibralter to meet a convoy escorted by the SENECA, was 
struck and almost broken in two by a torpedo from one of three German 
submarines bound for the Mediterranean. Warned to stay away, because 
of the presence of enemy submarines, and despite the tactical doctrine 
which would have justified the SENECA in refusing to risk her own des¬ 
truction, she followed the laws of her service, and three times stopped 
to send off small boats in order to take on survivors. These boats, 
manned by Coast Guardsmen, came alongside the COWSLIP, in the chop and 
darkness, and succeeded in saving two officers and 79 enlisted men. 

Again on Seotember 16, 1918, the British collier WELLINGTON, one 
of a convoy being escorted by the SENECA to Gibralter, was hit by a 
torpedo, her forefoot being blown sway and her number one hold flooded. 

Her crew, anticipating another attack, abandoned the ship though she 
was still afloat, and declined to return on board. The SENECA’s men, 
accustomed to taking chances and impressed with the urgency of keeping 
the bridge of ships intact, volunteered to board the torpedoed vessel 
and try to bring her to port. The SENECA * s navigation officer, a 
warrant machinist, and 18 others, most of them petty officers, were 
chosen for the task-. They were soon joined by 14 of the WELLINGTON’S 
crew, including two mates and her master, who said he could not see others 
doing the duty which was his, but refused the offer of command and was 
so assigned as first officer* After some minor repairs, the WELLINGTON 


- 24 ~ 




got up steam and headed for Brest, making a good seven knots. The men 
were never off duty, some doing work they had never done before in order to 
keep up steam, and all standing continuous watches. In the meantime, the 
destroyer WARRINGTON had been dispatched to the aid of the collier. The 
WELLINGTON persisted in coming head up to a rising sea, refusing to steer 
to leeward, and her condition made it impossible to rig a sea anchor or 
to let down her chain cables. Ingenuity and courage were of no avail, 
and the collier shipped water, commencing to settle at the head. As 
the gale increased it became apparent that the ship could not be saved. 

The only lifeboat, with seven of the WELLINGTON’S crew and one Coast 
Guardsman, ordered into it to unhook forward, drifted away when someone 
cut the stern painter, and the seamen were unable to pull back. At 
0);00, all aboard the WELLINGTON abandoned ship as she sank, the lucky 
ones clinging to life rafts they themselves had made, until dawn. The 
WARRINGTON picked up the men in the lifeboat, but could not lower boats 
in the storm, and stood by until daybreak. Then, by the use of lines, 
she picked dp 1$ men, of whom eight were Coast Guardsmen, Eleven of 
the SENECA’s complement, including the machinist and gunner’s mate of 
the Navy on the temporary assignment, were lost, as were five of the 
collier’s crew. Of this exploit the British Admiralty said, "Seldom 
in the annals of the sea, has there been exhibited such self-abnegation, 
such cool courage and such unfailing diligence in the face of almost 
unsurmountable difficulties, xxxxx America is to be. congratulated." 

On the stormy night of September 26, 1918, the cutter TAMPA, bound 
for Milford Haven, after having escorted a convoy to Gibraltar, dis¬ 
appeared. with a loud explosion, leaving no trace other than some float¬ 
ing wreckage. It 'is believed that she was torpedoed by a German sub¬ 
marine. Two bodies, clad in naval unifoims, were found, but these were 
never identified. One hundred and thirty men died that night, 111 of 
then! Coast Guardsmen and h of the Navy® The Coast Guardsmen suffered 
the greatest loss in proportion to its strength of any of the armed 
services in World War I. 

Following World War I, the experiment of Prohibition added many 
problems to the work of the Coast Guard. While enforcement of the 
unpopular law was unpleasant and often dangerous, funds were allotted 
for expansion with a generosity never before equalled. The Service 
was greatly augmented and improved, especially in the fields of com¬ 
munication and intelligence,. 

With the repeal of the 18th Amendment in 1933, ^nd the resulting 
subsidence in the smuggling of liquor into the United States, the Coast 
Guard underwent a drastic reduction in its activities. A reorganisation 
resulted so that operations could be continued with the now limited 
funds. The Coast Guard districts were rearranged and authority was 
generally decentralized, so as to give the district commanders greater 
responsibility and permit greater flexibility and coordination of their 
forces. The efficiency of the service was consequently immensely in¬ 
creased even with drastically reduced appropriations. In 1937, the 


25 


life stations were reduced in number and the remaining units improved 
and modernized. 

THE LIGHTHOUSE On July 1, 1939, the Lighthouse Service of the 

SERVICE Department of Commerce was transferred to the 

1769-1939 Coast Guard under the Presidents Reorganization 

Plan No® IIo Wien first established in 1769? 
the Lighthouse Service was assigned to the 
Treasury Department and at first was under the direct control of the 
secretary® With the increase in the number and scope of its duties? 
it was transferred to the Revenue-Marine Division of the Treasury 
in l8ii5>® 

For many years the collectors of customs had acted as local super¬ 
intendents of lighthouses, the supply and inspection of lights being 
performed chiefly under contract® The establishment of lights was with¬ 
out much system and the administration of the service very loose. In 
185>1, a planning board was created for the purpose of making a report, 
which would serve as a guide for legislation® As a result of its re¬ 
port, Congress set up the Lighthouse Board in 1852« This body,being. 
composed of officers of the Army and Navy and civilian scientists, 
continued to function until 1910® Among its naval members at one 
time or another were Admirals Dewey, Evans, and Schley. Meade, General 
of the Union Forces at Gettysburg, performed duties on this board, as 
did Rosencrans, Beauregard, and Semnes, who later aommanded the con¬ 
federate vessel ALABAMA, responsible for the famous n ALABAMA claims« n 
Eminent civilian scientists who served on the board were Henry Horton, 
the first President of the Stevens Institute of Technology, and Joseph 
Henry of the Smithsonian Institution The Board established twelve 
districts, provided for their administration and inspection, instituted 
improvements in equipment, and fostered experimentation with new devices. 
To it belongs much of the credit for the excellence of our present day 
navigational aids. 

Attempts were made in 1862 and from 1882 to 1885 to transfer the 
lighthouse establishment to the Navy, but these all failed. When the 
Department of Commerce and Labor was created in 1903? the Lighthouse 
Service was placed under it, however, remaining with the Department 
of Commerce when the Labor Department was split off to be headed by a 
separate cabinet officer® In 1910, the Lighthouse Board was superseded 
by the Bureau of Lighthouses in the Commerce Department,, The districts 
were rearranged and the work consolidated, with major changes in organi¬ 
zation, although functions and activities were not altered to any major 
extent. 


In 1939? the Lighthouse Bureau was consolidated with the Coast Guard 
and a further reorganization embraced all of the combined activities of 
the two services into a well integrated and effective whole. The former 


- 26 - 





9 divisions and 13 districts of the Coast Guard, and 17 districts of 
the Lighthouse Service, were combined into 13 districts, including 
Puerto Rico, Hawaii, Alaska, and the interior rivers of the United 
States* The separate field organization of the former 3.ife-saving 
activities was, at the same time, integrated with other functions of 
the Coast Guard* The grouping of shore stations, including life¬ 
boat and light stations, and certain bases, which was put into effect 
at this time, proved of practical value a few years later when the 
Coast Guard was given the task of organizing the Beach Patrol in 
19k2„ This integrated system of shore establishments then became the 
key of our entire coastal defense system 0 

The duty of establishing and maintaining aids to navigation now 
became one of the principal duties of the Coast Guard 0 For many years 
there had been a continuing demand for new establishments due, in major 
part, to the improvement and extension of navigable channels by the 
Corps of Engineers, U* S* Army, and in part, to the constantly increas¬ 
ing activity in navigation of small craft requiring aids for their pro¬ 
tection in waters hitherto not marked 0 During the .fiscal year I9liQ, 
therefore, .1*581 new aids were established by the Coast Guard and 76? 
aids were discontinued, leaving a net increase of 8ll| aids, bringing the 
total close to 30,U20* By June 30, 19^6, this.had been increased to 

36,879. 

U* S*. The Coast Guard f s function of maritime safety 

MARITIME SERVICE had thus scarcely been emphasized with this 
1938-19U1 addition to the two formerly paramount functions 

of law enforcement and military readiness, when 
the tocsin of war began to be sounded in 
Europe with the invasion * of Poland by Germany on 1 September, 1939. Ever 
since its latest reorganization in 1933, the Coast Guard had been giving 
constant attention to preparedness for war* Improvements in armament 
and fire control equipment of its vessels were effected* A carefully 
planned system of small arms training for personnel, including gunnery 
exercises on vessels, and participation in Army and Navy maneuvers, 
added to the Service's preparations* The U* S. Maritime Service, a 
training service established by the Maritime Commission under the 
Merchant Marine Act of 1936, and continuously administered by the Coast 
Guard for that commission since that date, continued its training, of 
Merchant Marine personnel*' Later on February 28, 19h2, this service was 
transferred to the Coast Guard, by that time serving as part of the Navy, 
but remained there only 6 months before being transferred back to the 
War Shipping Administration on 11 'July, 1914-2* From 1 October,. 1938> 
to 1 November, 19Ul, however, while being administered by the Coast 
Guard under the Treasury, its enrolloes had grown from 106 to. 10,-7l«2 
or 21 per, cent of the personnel of all American merchant vessels of 
1,000 gross tons or over* The training.-of these merchant officers 


- 27 





and men by the Coast Guard was not -only, to fill the needs of the emer¬ 
gency, but had a long time -objective of preventing disasters at sea 
by providing more trained and efficient personnel for our merchant ships 
It was the first time, moreover, that the Federal Government had ever 
embarked upon, such a systematic program* 

COAST GUARD In order to further increase safety at sea, 

RESERVE (AUY.I LI ART) Congress created the Coast Guard Reserve^ 

1939 on June 23, 1939® This was a voluntary non¬ 

military organization designed to train and 
instruct those using the high seas and navi¬ 
gable waters of the. United States and to secure the cooperation of 
yachtsmen and other small boat owners in the observance of the laws 
and adoption of safety devices on their boats# Yachtsmen and small 
boat owners became enthusiastic reservists and their boats later 
became available as coastal pickets, when in 19U2 and 19l;3> the 
German and Italian submarines began to prey on our coastal s-lipping 
along' the .Atlantic and Gulf coasts# 

NEUTRALITY PATROL On September 5, 1939, the President.proclaimed 

1 939 - 19U0 ' the neutrality of the United States- in the 

war which had broken out in Europe and pursuant 
to Executive Order of that date the Coast Guard 
assumed a ..Wide f ield of responsibility in the prevention of unneutral 
acts by merchant vessels,. either of the United States or of other 
neutral countries, and against the committing of belligerent action by 
merchant vessels of warring nations while within the waters of the 
United States# A systematic and extensive patrol by aircraft, vessels 
and.coastal stations was carried out all along the coasts of the United 
States# To prevent unneutral communications the., radio apparatus aboard 
merchant vessels of belligerent nations was inspected and scaled while 
the vessels were within United States territorial waters. Defensively 
armed merchant vessels were inspected to insure that they were not 
operating as auxiliary merchant cruisers or commerce raiders and basing 
in U„ S. ports in violation of the neutrality law* In maintaining a 
strict surveillance, merchant vessels were sighted and identified at 
sea or in ports of tho United States# 

VJEATH5R PATROL ' In 19U0, the Coast Gueird, in cooperation with 

l9RQ - 19 I 4 I the Weather Observation Service, began to use 

its newly modernized cutters, now capable of 
extended cruises, to establish an Atlantic 
Weather Observation Service. The cutters took turns patrolling certain 
weather stations, which were areas about 100 miles square, between 
Bermuda and'the Azores, usually, for 30 day periods, and their daily 
reports were designed primarily for the protection of the rapidly in¬ 
creasing trans-Atlantic air commerce. 

1# Later became known as Auxiliary in 19Ul when the military Reserve 
was established. 


- 28 








ICE BREAKING Under an Executive Order, dated December 21, 

19^6 ~ 19U1 1936, the Coast Guard was directed to assist 

in keeping open channels and harbors by. means 
of ice breaking in accordance with the reason¬ 
able demands of commerce. The increased demands for iron ore, both in 
19h0-hl f and especially with'the inauguration of the Lend-lease Program, 
on March 11, 19Ul, moved Congress to authorise the chartering of ice¬ 
breaking vessels on the Great Lakes, Ice breaking operations which . 
followed resulted, with the cooperation of Coast Guard cutters, in 
the opening of the Sault Ste.. Marie canal on March -28, 19^1, the 
earliest ever recorded since records were established in 1855* As 
a result the loading of iron ore at Lake Superior ports totalled . . 
6,95U,793 tons in the single, month of April 19)41, as against an all 
time previous high of 3,770,555 tons. This represented a clear gain, 
in volume of iron ore available for national defense at this critical 
juncture in our history, such as could have been had in no other 
practical way. 

PORT SECURITY On June 27, 19)40, the President issued a pro- 

- 19)46 clamation, supplementing his proclamation of 

September 8, 1939, which had declared that a 
national emergency existed, and had invoked 
the powers conferred upon him in such emergency by the so called 
Espionage Act of June 15, 1917* This second proclamation empowered 
the Secretary of the Treasury to make rules and regulations governing 
the anchorage and movement of any vessel, foreign or domestic, in 
the territorial waters of the United States, and to inspect such vessels 
at any time, and place guards on them, in order to secure them from 
damage or injury, or so as to prevent damage or injury to any harbor 
or waters of the United States; to take full possession and control 
of such vessels, removing the officers and crew and all other persons, 
not specially authorized by him to go or remain on board. With this 
step the Coast Guard became entrusted with the immensely‘important func¬ 
tion of Port Security. These powers came almost simultaneously with 
the powers conferred on the Service by the "Dangerous Cargo Act" of 
October 9, 19h0, which gave the Bureau of Marine Inspection and Naviga¬ 
tion of the Department of Commerce, and the Coast Guard, joint jurisdic¬ 
tion over every vessel, domestic and foreign, regardless of character, 
tonnage, si^e, service or method of propulsion, on the navigable waters 
of the United' States, its territories and possessions, not including 
the Panama Canal and Philippines, but excluding public vessels and 
tankers. It forbade vessels carrying 12 or more passengers to transport, 
carry*, convey, store, stow or use on board certain high explosives, sus¬ 
ceptible of detonation by a blasting cap or detonating fuse. Trans¬ 
portation of such explosives on other than passenger vessels was per¬ 
mitted only under regulation of the Secretary of Commerce. This con- ; 
trol of dangerous cargoes came none too soon, for in the calendar year 


- 29 - 





19 )i.O, our total exports of ammunition and. explosives had totaled 
$£6,1*1*9,969 and by April of 19l*l had already reached $31*262,827 for 
a third of that year. The navigable waterfront real property of the 
United States which these regulations were designed to protect, was 
ascertained to be valued in 19U2 at $3,777,263,181* with an additional 
$ 89 £, 1 * 86,£76 of personal property in navigable waterfront warehouses. 

The real property included some £,189,000 linear feet of wharfage over 
which l,20l*,609,0Q0 tons of cargo had passed in 1939. 

Fire losses to navigable waterfront, property, counting only con¬ 
flagrations in which the losses were more than $ 10,000 had increased 
from $ 6 ,788,£07 in 19l*0 to $32,178,380 in 191*1© By 19h2 these losses 
had been reduced with the enforcement of the Coast Guard's Port Security 
regulations to $ 21 *, 926 , 738 , 

Important to the effectiveness of port security was the passage of 
the Coast Guard Auxiliary and Reserve Act approved February 19, 19^1• 
This established the Coast Guard Regular and Temporary Reserve, de¬ 
signating .the groups formerly termed the "Reserve" as the "Auxiliary" 
and was designed to augment the regular personnel of the Coast Guard 
so as to enable it to meet extra-ordinary situations incident to 
natural emergencies or to war. The act provided for the acquisition 
by the Coast Guard of motorboats and yachts belonging to members of 
the Coast Guard Auxiliary, permitting their utilization on patrol duty 
in our ports and inland waters. Under this act there had been added 
to the regular establishment by 29 February, 19l*l*, 6,793 regular 
reserve officers, 297 regular reserve warrant officers, and 13 £, 2 oO 
regular reserve enlisted men. In addition to these regular reserves 
1*£,197 temporary members of the reserve had been enrolled, principally 
for Port Security work, as well as 22,1*76 plant guards. Numerous 
Volunteer Port Security Forces 'were organized by Temporary Reservists 
in all the major ports to guard wharves, shipyards, and waterfront 
property on a part time basis and with all services donated to the 
Government, Some l£,£00,000 tons of explosives and ammunition were 
handled under Coast Guard supervision from January 1, 19l*0, to June 
30 , 191 * 6 , without a major casualty or loss of life, 

PROTECTIVE When on March 20, 19l*l, it was ascertained 

CUSTODY that an Italian vessel at Wilmington. U. 0 .. 

191IT" was being sabotaged by its crew, the Coast 

Guard was alerted and within ten days had 
taken into protective custody under the terms 
of the Espionage Act of 1917, 28 Italian merchant vessels in various 
American ports, 27 of which were found to be damaged; two German vessels, 
one of which was damaged; and 3£ Danish vessels, none of which was 
damaged 4 Altogether 6£0 Italian and 63 German officers and crew were 
imprisoned, while 1*70 Danish officers and crew were released in the 
custody of the Danish Consuls or given their liberty. 


- 30 - 





10 CUTTERS On April 5, 19hl, the President authorized the 

TO BRITAIN Secretary of the Treasury to transfer'under 

l9l 1 the terms of the Lend-Lease Act, ten 2S'0-foot 

cutters of the Coast Guard to the United • 

Kingdom,. Two of these, the PONTCHARTR/VIN 
renamed R.M.S. HART LAND, and the SEBACxO renamed H.M.S.WALNEY, with 
British crews but flying the American flag and having on board American 
shock troops, forced the boon at the entrance of Oran Harbor, in North 
Africa on November 8, 1S%2. Both were sunk. Another, the CAYUGA,. , 
renamed H.M.S. TOTLAND was credited with sinking a -German submarine 
on 29 November, 19hl, while a ‘fourth ' H.M.S. CULVER (ex-MENDOTA) was 
torpedoed on 31 ’January, 19^2, with 13 survivors. Others, served in 
escort groups in Indian and S’outh African waters-. Of the seven which 
remained at the end of the war, three had been returned under the terms 
of the Lend-Lease Act by February 19U6, *and of the other four,, two had 
been damaged and were undergoing repair and two were still on active 
duty with British naval forces. 

GREENLAND When the Lend-Lease Act became law on March 11, 

PATROL 19Ulj the President, on April 19, lpljl, author¬ 
ial - 19U6 ized the first Lend-Lease transfer of food to 

Great Britain, The Germans sent the great 
battleship BISMARCK, in May 19l|l, to ’ raid .the. 

British food bearing convoys. With her was the PRINZ EUGEN and a wolf 
pack of submarines and their aim was to destroy the United Nation’s 
supply line in the North Atlantic. On the afternoon of 21. May, I9hl, 
eight east bound British ships vrero reported torpedoed in position 
57 0 Ul’N; Ul 0 29’W. Three Coast Guard cutters in the vicinity, the 
NORTHLAND, MODOC, and GENERAL GREENE, were ordered to proceed to the 
scene to pick up survivors. The GREENE brought in 39 survivors and 
120 were picked up by British rescue ships,- Later the MODOC found 
itself in line of fire between the* BISMARCK and the British battleship 
HOOD, both of which were eventually sunk; the HOOD in this' engagement 
and the BISMARCK after a chase which followed. 

Soon after this on 1 June, 19l4l> the South Greenland Patrol was 
organised consisting of the CGG’s MODOC, COMANCHE, RARITAN end USS- 
BOWDOIN. Operating under the Chief of Naval Operations in the area 
from Cape Brewster to Cape Farewell to Upernivik, Greenland, the patrol 
was under the command of Lt. Comdr. H, G. Relford, USCG. On 7 June, 

19iil, the President approved the "Basic. Joint Array and' Navy Plan for 
the Defense of Greenland* which provided for' the establishment of the 
Northeast Greenland Patrol, operating; under Commander in Chief, U. S. 
Atlantic Fleet and the South Greenland patrol, but directly under Chief 
of Naval Operations, On 1 July, 19^1, this Northeast Patrol.was organi¬ 
zed in Boston, under Comdr. E. H. Smith, USCG, and consisted of the CGC’s 
NORTHLAND, NORTH STAR and the USS BEAR. On October 25, 19i;l, the two 
patrols were consolidated as the South Greenland Patrol under Comdr, Smith* 


- 31 - 








Greenland's geographical location in the Western Hemishpere and 
the United States obligations to protect such territories, undertaken 
tlirough the Act of Habana, in July 191*0, created a vital interest. in 
the control of Greenland,, When Germany occupied Denmark on 9 April, 

19tO, the threat of an unfriendly power occupying Greenland became 
acute. In’May, 19l*0, the COMANCHE had proceeded.to Godthaab, Green¬ 
land, via Ivigtut, transporting the first American Consul. Con¬ 
siderable concern was felt for the cryolite mine at Ivigtut and the 
U. S. agreed to sell the Greenland Administration armament for its 
defense. On 17 March, 19bi, the CAYUGA had left Boston with the 
South Greenland Survey Expedition-on board* This expedition opera¬ 
ting under the State, War, Treasury, and Navy Department, was in¬ 
structed to locate and recommend air fields, seaplane bases, radio 
stations, meteorological stations, and aids to navigation and to 
furnish hydrographic information. On 9 April, 19i*l, the U. S. and 
Denmark signed an ’'Agreement Relating to the Defense of Greenland," 
which included Greenland in the United States system of cooperative 
hemispheric defense. 

On 12 September, 1941, the Norwegian sealer BUSKOE was sighted 
by the NORTHLAND, outside the three mile limit off Hold-with-Hope 
heading for MacKenzie Bay/Greenland. The NORTH STAR had been 
informed earlier ’by some members, of the Sledge Patrol that they had 
seen a strange steamer entering Young Sound and had radioed this 
information to Commander Smith, proceeding to Young Sound to search 
for the vessel. On the 12th, they discovered supplies of German . 
origin, freshly landed in Rudis Rugt, On the same day Commander 
Smith sighted the BUSKOE and took her into McKenzie Bay to look..her 
over. At first the 27 persons on board, most of them Danish hunters 
and Norwegian trappers, claimed to be a fishing and hunting party* 

But after questioning they revealed that two sets of hunters had been 
dropped off, one with radio equipment, about five miles north. Com¬ 
mander Smith immediately ordered a prize crew from the NORTH STAR to be 
placed aboard the BUSKOE, which was found to be equipped with a main 
transmitter of £0 watts and a portable transmitter of Ij.0 watts, as well 
as receiving equipment. The vessel was believed to be engaged in 
sending weather reports to Axis- controlled territory. The following 
night the NORTHLAND anchored in a fjord about 5> miles away and 12 men 
went ashore at midnight, capturing three German radiomen and their 
equipment and code. Secret instructions were found, including Hitler’s 
plans for radio stations in the far north. The Coast Guard seizure of 
the BUSKOE was the first naval capture of World War II. 

On August 16, 191*1, the first step was taken 
for the-transfer of a complete part of the 
Coast Guard.to,the Navy. The. Honolulu Coast 
Guard District was transferred by Executive 


TRANSFER TO NAVY 
NOVEMBER 1, 19U1 


- 32 - 




Order on that date to operate as part of the Navy* By Executive Order 
of September 11, 19)41, all units, vessels, and personnel of the Coast 
Guard previously transferred to, or under detail with the Navy* and 
such additional units, vessels, and personnel of the Coast Guard as 
was .agreed to between the Chief of Naval Operations and the Commandant 
of the Coast Guard, would operate as part of the Navy and the personnel 
be subject to the laws enacted for the government of the Navy* Finally 
on 1 November, I9I4.I, the President ordered, that the Coast Guard should, 
from that date, until further orders, operate as part of the Navy* Im¬ 
mediately and smoothly the entire Coast Guard began functioning as part 
of the Navy in accordance with the mobilization plan previously prepared* 
Coast Guard Districts automatically went under the control of the Naval! 
Districts in which they were located and to whose geographical con¬ 
figuration they had already been harmonized* The respective Coast 
Guard District Commanders were designated Senior Coast Guard.Officers, 
later changed to District Coast Guard Officer* On March.30, 19U2, the 
Coast Guard was designated as a service of the Navy Department to be 
administered by the Commandant of the Coast Guard under the .Secretary 
of the Navy, in accordance, with general directives issued by the 
Secretary and by the Commander , in Chief, U. S* Fleet and Chief of 
Naval Operations* The larger cutters and patrol boats, capable of 
offshore operations, had, before the declaration of war, been assigned 
to the Fleet, Naval Sea Frontiers, or Task Forces, for'ccmvoy, anti¬ 
submarine and patrol duty. 

WORLD WAR II . With the declaration of war on December 8, 19hl, 

I9I4.-L - 1 9hS * the Coast Guard was already part of the Navy 

and its cutters immediately got into action. 

On May 9, 19U2, the CGC ICARUS sunk a German 
U-boat while proceeding southward from. New-York on a routine run and- 
took 33 prisoners, including the submarine’s Commanding Officer. The 
submarine was seen dead ahead about 111 yards distant as the cutter 
sailed through calm seas just off the Carolina coast. General Quarters 
was sounded and the ICARUS flashed into action. Speeding forward she 
reached the spot over the sub and dropped a pattern.of depth charges* 

As she turned to come back for another attack, a terrific explosion 
occurred in the open sea about 200 yards off the port side. The 
ICARUS crossed the spot where the undersea raider was submerged, dropped 
another pattern of charges, and followed up with two singlo charges in 
quick succession. Then air bubbles began rising to the surface. Sud¬ 
denly the crippled U-boat shot up from below, her bow pointing skyward 
at a k$° angle. The conning tower burst open, and the submarine crew 
members scrambled on deck and made for the deck gun. The guns of the 
ICARUS opened fire, sweeping the Germans back toward the conning tower. 
Then the sub started to sink, the Germans jumping into the sea. The 
vessel suddenly plunged beneath the surface and .the engagement was over, 
Lt. Maurice D« Jester, USCG, the Commanding Officer of the ICARUS, was 
awarded the Navy Cross. 


- 33 - 



The CGC CAMPBELL was the next to register a definite kill in 
the gruelling anti-submarine warfare. On 22 February, 1943, while 
on convoy escort duty in mid-Atlantic, she sighted a submarine sub¬ 
merging at 2,000 yardso The time was 0603. A sound contact was 
made at 1,500 yards,, A stern chase was assumed and as the CAMPBELL 
closed to 700 yards she reduced speed. No lead was taken and a 
10 charge pattern was fired. Diesel oil then appeared on the sur¬ 
face, Either the submarine was taking advantage of the protection 
afforded by a torpedoed ship, or an oil tank had been damaged. At 1210, 
sound contact was made at 1,000 yards dead ahead, A periscope appeared 
20 yards off the port bow and passed rapidly down the port side of the 
CAMPBELL. The conning officer watched the boil of the submarine’s 
screws, and fired 5 charges by eye to straddle the estimated position 
of the U-boat. The enemy vessel seemed to have run into the explosion 
of the #4 thrower. Three surges of water were seen after the explosion 
UDheaval subsided, but there was no evidence of damage. Charges were 
subsequently dropped on sound contact 12 to 21 minutes later. At 
2015 a contact was made at 4,600 yards and approached at IB knots. 

The sub was sighted on the starboard bow and full right rudder was 
ordered to ram. The submarine hit the CAMPBELL under the bridge and 
then in the engine room. Either before or after the ramming, 3" and 
30 MM gunfire from the CAMPBELL riddled the submarine and prevented 
her from manning her guns. A depth charge attack after the ramming 
further damaged the submarine. Five survivors from the submarine 
were picked up. The CAMPBELL’S engine room was flooded and her power 
lost, preventing further action. The submarine was sunk, as evidenced 
by the survivors, the ramming and the explosions. This was a definite - 
kill, and search was abandoned at once. Apparently one submarine had 
been sunk by depth charges and another by collision. The Polish 
destroyer BURZA was sent to the cutter's assistance. Later the CAMPBELL 
was towed to Naval Drydock, St. John's, Newfoundland, then to Argentia 
where she underwent repairs. The commanding officer of the CAMPBELL, 
Captain James A. Hirshfield, USCG, was awarded the Navy Cross, 

A third definite submarine sinking by a Coast Guard cutter during 
World War II was on 17 April, 1943, when the CGC SPENCER, while escort¬ 
ing a convoy which was proceeding due East to avoid submarines which 
had been reported South of Greenland and Iceland, established a sound 
contact at 2,100 yards and dropped a pattern of 10 depth charges at 
0646. After that she had several contacts during the morning which 
were either non-sub or were later lost* Rejoining the convoy she had 
a sound contact at 1050 at 1,500 yards and dropped ill depth charges. 
Then she reestablished it 8 minutes later dropping 11 more charges. 

After that she began to maneuver between the columns of the convoy and 
reestablished^ the contact there at 1117. She fired a pattern of 
mousetraps. At 1138 an enemy submarine surfaced to conning tower 
depth about 2,500 yards away, drawing slowly to the right, being still 
underway but apparently damaged. Two minutes later the SPENCER was 


- 34 - 


firing all her guns and many hits, on the submarined conning tower 
and at its base, were observed. The crew of the submarine was then 
observed abandoning ship via the conning tower* The CGC DUANE, in 
the immediate vicinity, assisted, firing all her batteries. Mer¬ 
chant vessels in the rear columns of the convoy also opened fire on 
the submarine. At 1145 the SPENCER ceased firing and maneuvered 
in the vicinity of the disabled U-boat. At 1215 she lowered a boat 
with a boarding party. Five minutes later the submarine began sinking 
and sank d'tern first at 1227. The SPENCER's boat began picking up 
survivors. At 1225 the boarding party returned, having boarded the 
submarine mpmentarily .prior to its sinking. Three men h,ad been 
observed to be dead in the conning tower. One German officer and 
eighteen men were rescued by the SPENCER and twenty men were rescued 
by the DUANE. Eight of the SPENCER's crew were injured when the davit 
of the #1 boat was damaged by a projectile and its superstructure by 
shrapnel. One man died of his wounds, 

"The bombs were bad," said a German officer of the sunken U-175 
who had been picked up by the DUANE. "The ship was not hurt," he 
continued "but inside it was all bad. Everything shaking. Things 
fall down. It smelled bad and hurt the eyes," The attack, he said 
had been excellent. "We came up and saw you in the periscope, but 
you saw us and we knew it was all over. Our chance to get you was 
gone. We didn't like the bombs. We went down when you saw us and the 
bombs started going off. Things stopped and would not work, A lot 
of things broke." He explained that they had raised the flippers and 
pumped air to try to steady the submarine. They could' not steady her, 
so began bringing- her to the surface. When they reached' the surface 
the DUANE's guns had started and very soon the German officer had 
jumped into the water. 

It was not until World War II was over that German apd Japanese 
records confirmed as definite sinkings other attacks which Coast Guard 
craft had reported on Nazi and Japanese submarines. On 13 June, 1942, 
the USCG cutter THETIS, it was then revealed, had.sunk the German 
submarine U-157 at 24° 13*N, 82° 03'W. The USCG cutter McLANE and 
the Coast Guard manned YP-251, it was then learned had indeed, finished 
off the Japanese submarine RO-32, which they had reported having trapped 
in Alaskan waters at 55° 20'N, 134° 40'W, on July 8, 1942; in the Gulf 
of Mexico the German submarine U-166, which the Coast Guard plarte V-214 
had reported bombing on July 28, 1942, was confirmed as being sunk by 
USCG airplane squadron 212 at 28° 37*N, 90° 45‘W on 1 August, 1942; 
the USCG cutter INGHAM was,credited with sinking the German submarine 
U-626 on 15 December, 1942, at 56° 46'N, 27° 12'W; the German U-225 
was sunk on 21 February, 1943, by the USCG cutter SPENCER at 51°25’N, 

27° 28 f W; while on 18 May, 1945, the German U-866 was confirmed as 
having been sunk at 43°18'N, 6l° 08'W by four Coast Guard manned 


- 35 


destroyer escorts, the USS LOWE, MENGES, PRIDE, and MOSLEY. 

On 17 June, 1942, the Cornmander-in-Chief, U. 3.. Fleet, notified 
the Commanders of the Eastern and Gulf Sea Frontiers that it had been 
directed that there be acquired the maximum number of civilian craft 
that were in any way capable of going to sea, in good weather, for 
a period of at least 43 hours at cruising speeds. These craft were 
to be acquired and manned by the Coast Guard as an expansion of the 
Coast Guard Reserve. They were to be fitted to carry at least four 
300 pound depth charges, to be armed with at least one machine gun, 
preferably 50 caliber, and equipped with a radio set, preferably 
voice. These groups, and similar groups organized from similar 
Navy craft, would be assigned by sea frontier commanders to restricted 
patrol stations (pickets) spaced along the fifty fathom curve of the 
Atlantic and Gulf coast, particularly in those areas where submarines 
were found to be concentrated. 

All of the District Coast Guard officers began at once to carry 
out orders based upon this directive issued then by the Sea Frontier 
Commanders. The prime mission of the coastal pickets being one of 
enemy submarine-observation and anti-submarine patrol, the vessels 
which they began to assemble and equip were directed to observe and 
report actions of all hostile submarines, surface and air forces, 
and to attack and destroy them when their armament permitted. They 
were also to conduct rescue operations off shore, reporting all 
vessels in distress, survivors located and other unusual matters 
of Naval interest. Between January 1, 1942, and January 1, 1943, 

Coast Guard floating units increased from 3,732 to 3,357. The major 
portion of this 4,625 increase was in reserve boats which rose in number 
from 314 to.3,143, miscellaneous motorboats of less than 65 feet which 
showed an increase of 611 from 174 on January 1, 194?, and miscellaneous 
small craft which increased by 240 during the same period. Other cate¬ 
gories which showed substantial increases were landing party boats 
which increased by 600 , converted fire boats which went up by 121 units, 
and miscellaneous cutters of less than 100 feet, mostly VP's, which 
increased by 102. 

There were thousands of calls on*the regular cutters for assistance. 
The CGC NIKE brought 39 survivors of the S3 SAN GIL into Ocean City, 
Maryland, on 3 February, 1942, and three days later rescued 33 persons 
from the torpedoed tanker CHINA ARROW in the same vicinity. On the 
16th of February, 1942, the CGC WOODBURY brought in 40 members of the 
crew of the tanker E, H. BLUM. On 15 February, 1943, the CGC CALYPSO 
removed 42 persons from a lifeboat of the torpedoed Brazilian SS BUARQUE, 
30 miles east of Cape Henry. Lifeboat stations along the Atlantic coast 
picked up hundreds of survivors in lifeboats during the first months of. 
1942. Many of these lifeboats and rafts from sunken merchant vessels 


- 36 - 


were spotted by Coast Guard aircraft on their anti-submarine patrols 
off the coasts. At the beginning of the war the Coast Guard had 56 
planes based in ten air stations from Maine all around the Coast to 
the state of Washington. Not yet equipped, in many instances, with 
bombs*, these planes went out on regular patrols and on spotting sur¬ 
vivors notified nearby fishing vessels and other craft of their exact 
location- 

On the 14th of January, 1942, the Coast Guard plane V-177 pro¬ 
ceeding to the position of a wreck, located a raft adrift with six 
persons on board and dropped food and restoratives.' On 15 February, 

1942, the V-186 discovered lifeboats containing 30 survivors and 
notified the Elizabeth City Air Station which later sent out coastal 
pickets to pick them up. On 8 March, 1942, the V-183 found lifeboats 
of the SS ARBUTAN off the North Cardlina coast and directed the CGC 
CALYPSO-to the scene. On 7 April, 1942, a Coast Guard plane sighted 
a boat containing 24 survivors and directed a British trawler to it. 

On 1 May, 1942, two planes from Elizabeth City Coast Guard Air Station 
located a lifeboat with 13 survivors, made a landing in the open sea, 
furnished the survivors food, water, and medical supplies and took 
an injured man ashore, the remainder being later rescued by a CG 
lifeboat station.boat. On 2 May, 1942, plane V-I 67 made a landing 
in a rough sea and rescued two survivors from a torpedoed freighter. 

They.had been adrift 12 days, without food or water. In July, 1942, 
a small CG plane took aboard 27 survivors from a torpedoed vessel in 
the Gulf of Mexico and landed them safely. And so the story goes. 

The Coast Guard regulations said they had to go out, but some of 
them never came back. 

Justice cannot be done, within any short space of time to the 
story of the Coast Guard in World War II. . The Coast Guardsmen’s 
experience and habit of courage fitted them for the war assignment 
of manning many of the landing barges that brought our soldiers and 
marines to the hostile beaches from Guadalcanal to Tokyo in the Pacific 
and from Casablanca to Normandy in North Africa and Europe. 572 Coast 
Guardsmen were killed in action out of a total of 1,035 that died abroad. 
The others died of wounds or disease or other causes and 400 in accidents 
abroad. Of the 843 that died at home, 456 met accidental death, 325 died 
of disease and 62 of other causes. Altogether 1,878 Coast Guardsmen died 
in the war. At the same time 1,868 were decorated, one receiving the 
Congressional Medal of Honor, 6 the Navy Cross, 1 the Distinguished 
Service Cross, 67 the Legion of Merit and so on. 

Coast Guardsmen manned 349 Navy vessels during the war, 291 Army 
vessels and 764 Coast Guard vessels of 65 feet or over in length or a 
total of 1,404 larger craft. Twelve Coast Guard manned Navy vessels 


- 37 - 


were lost and eleven Coast Guard vessels. One of the largest 
Coast Guard vessels, a 327 footer, lost, was t,he HAMILTON, sunk 
by a torpedo off Reykjavik, Iceland, on January 30, 1942. The 
ACACIA, a tender class cutter, was sunk by a submarine off Haiti 
on March 15, 1942, and the ESCANABA was torpedoed off Ivigtut, 
Greenland, on June 13, 1943<* Of the Coast Guard manned Navy vessels 
which were lost the SERPENS (AK-97) loaded with ammunition exploded 
at Guadalcanal on January 29, 1945, and the LEOPOLD was torpedoed 
off Iceland on March 9? 1944o The L3T-69 exploded at Pearl Harbor 
on May 21, 1944* the LST-167 was riddled by enemy planes at Vella 
La Vella on September 25, 1943, and 3„ater towed to Rendova, the 
LST-203 stranded in the SW Pacific on October 1, 1943* and the 
LST-767 was damaged in the Okinawa hurricane of March 9, 1946, and 
was decommissioned. The PC-590 grounded and sank in a typhoon off 
Okinawa on October 9> 1945« Four LCl(L)’s were lost in the French 
Invasion on June 6, 1944. On June 30, 1945, there were 49,283 Coast 
Guard personnel manning Navy vessels and 6,851 manning Army vessels, 
most of them freight and supply ships, large tugs, tankers, and 
freight boats. 

Coast Guard personnel increased from 27,415 on January 1, 1942, 
to 171,192 on June 30, 1945? exclusive of some 45,197 members of the 
Temporary Reserve and 22,476 plant guards serving at the peak on 
February 29, 1944* Its shore units increased from 1,096 to 2,237 
during the year 1942, its vehicles from 1,422 to 6,511 by June 30, 
1945, and. its lighted and unlighted buoys from 22,587 to 36,771 in 
the same period. By 30 June, 1945, it had 184 airplanes being flown 
by Coast Guard pilots 0 


On March 1, 1942, the President transferred 
from the Secretary of Commerce to the Commandant 
of the Coast Guard certain safety-at-sea func¬ 
tions of the former Bureau of Marine Inspection 
and Navigation, These had to do principally 
with inspection and certification of construc¬ 
tion of merchant vessels and the licensing and certification of 
officers, pilots and seamen. This transfer was for the duration of 
the war unless changed by Congress. The President’s Reorganization 
Plan III which became effective July 16, 1946, made this temporary 
transfer of functions permanent. 

With the succession of the Coast Guard to the duties of the 
Board of Supervising Inspectors and the Secretary of Commerce, with 
respect to inspection and navigation laws, there was established at 
Coast Guard Headquarters the Merchant Marine Inspection Division 
and the Merchant Marine Personnel Division, as well as a Merchant 
Marine Council in the Office of the Commandant, which advises on 


BMIN 

ALM-A LGAMATION 

TEMPORAR Y 1942 
PERMANENT 1946 


- 38 - 





problems of the merchant marine involving the Coast Guard and reviews* 
proposed merchant marine regulations. ‘The office of local inspectors 
was abolished and each district assigned a. marine inspection officer 
who assisted in the.direction of vessel inspection, licensing and 
certificating, investigation of casualties, and other merchant marine 
regulation activities including the numbering of motorboats and the 
handling of violations of the navigation laws, 

RETURN TO The Coast Guard was returned to the Treasury 

TREASURY - 19b6 on January 1, 19U6, continuing Air-Sea Rescue 

functions and the maintenance and operation 
of mid-ocean weather stations and air-sea 
navigational aids, under the directional control of the Navy, until 
July 1, 19i|6, with the Navy furnishing all vessels, facilities, equip¬ 
ment and supplies required for the maintenance and operation of such 
activities. At the same time wartime port security ended with the 
revocation of Executive Order No. 907U of February 25, 19U2, the 
Coast Guard continuing to enforce regulations governing the anchorage 
and movement of vessels under the authority of the Espionage Act of 
1917. A recodification of these regulations on a peace time basis 
has, meanwhile, been effected. The International Service of Ice 
Observation and Ice Patrol in the North Atlantic, which had been 
discontinued during the war years, was resumed in 19l|6 and for the 
first time aircraft supplemented the work of the patrol vessels in 
determining the limits of the ice fields from the air. Ocean weather 
stations maintained by the Navy during the war were transformed oack 
to the Coast Guard on July 1, 19lt6, and plans made to augment their 
number in accordance with the assignments made to this country by 
the Provisional International Civil Aviation Organization. 

COIf TON IC AT IONS The extensive System of Coast Guard owned 

and operated telephone lines and submarine 
cables, together with 20.radio traffic 
stations and 11 air radio stations along all our coasts, with a 
limited coverage of nearby ocean areas, were tied in with each other 
so that the various peacetime functions of the Coast Guard, in furnish¬ 
ing service to lifeboat stations, lighthouses and other units, were 
smoothly coordinated to handle maritime disasters of any character or 
extent. Tedium frequency direction finder stations previously opera¬ 
ted along the coasts vrere discontinued as a navigational aid to the 
public, owing to the use generally of shipboard direction finders* in 
conjunction with marine radio-beacons and the utilization of Loran and 
Radar. Tedium frequency radio direction finder facilities, however, 
v/ere to be continued at strategic points for Search and Rescue pur¬ 
poses only. Only two high frequency direction finder'stations, out 
of some 27 used during the war to provide better means of lpcating 
the position of ships, remained in commission on June 30, 19U6. 


- 39 - 





LORAN 


Loran, a system of radio navigation, designed 
to furnish reliable longitude and Latitude 
positions over greater areas than those covered 
by radio systems during the war, was planned for continued expansion 
by the Coast Guard, which had built and manned this wj.de flung system 
extending from Greenland to Tokyo, U9 stations in eleven chains 
existed on June 30, 19U6, 

RACON Eleven Racon stations remained in operation 

on June 30, 19l|6. These are fixed frequency 
transporters or radio beacons, v, r hich provide 
a coded response to radar interrogation on the proper frequency, 
giving a navigational fix by means of simultaneous display of both 
range and bearing information, and enabling craft adequately equipped 
to navigate in all vreather conditions within the limitations of their 
range, of these stations had been operated during the war, 

AIR-SEA The Air-Sea Rescue Agency was renamed Search 

RESCUE and Rescue Agency, This is an inter-agency 

group for the study of improved and standarized 
rescue and search methods of which the Commandant 
of the Coast Guard is head. Search and rescue units of the Coast Guard 
were integrated into the peace time organization and the whole developed 
into a system of constantly alerted communication, coastal lookout 
stations and patrols to institute instant and sj^stematic search and 
rescue procedure in case of maritime disaster. 

DEMOBILIZATION By June 30, 19^6, the Coast Guard demobiliza¬ 

tion from its wartime status had been almost 
. entirely effected, Yfith 269 cutters of 63 feet 

or over in length, the service had 166 additional motor lifeboats, 

1,672 motorboats and 2,78b pulling boats and barges. There were 722 
operational shore units, including 11 air stations, 10 operating, bases, 

189 lifeboat stations, only about l/3 of them active, and £12 light 
stations. Among the 66 logistical shore units were: 1±7 depots, 11 
repair bases, £ district and 2 general supply depots and the Coast 
Guard Yard at Curtis Bay, Maryland, The h9 Loran stations, lb district 
offices and 12 merchant marine foreign detachments completed the total 
of 863 shore units. 

Military personnel at the end of the 19b6 fiscal year totaled 
26 ,b06 consisting of 2,bb3 commissioned officers, 183 cadets, 797 chief 
warrant and warrant officers, and 22,983 enlisted personnel*, Civilian 
personnel totalled 5>,35>6. 

Returning to peace after war has become a formula to which the 
Coast Guard and its predecessor the Revenue Marine, have long been 
accustomed. The story of the Coast Guard is the seagoing story of the 
United States, in peace and war. The Coast Guard is essentially a peace¬ 
time maritime police force, engaged in providing law and order and safety 
at sea, but; always maintaining itself in a state of military readiness- 
for any national emergency. 





































o 039 225 492 4 



